9.8.09

crop art




Stunning crop art has sprung up across rice fields in Japan.

But this is no alien creation - the designs have been cleverly planted.

Farmers creating the huge displays use no ink or dye. Instead,

different colours of rice plants have been precisely and strategically arranged and grown in the paddy fields.

As summer progresses and the plants shoot up, the detailed artwork begins to emerge.


The farmers create the murals by planting little purple and yellow-leafed kodaimai rice

along with their local green-leafed tsugaru roman variety to create the coloured patterns between planting and harvesting in September.

The murals in Inakadate cover 15,000 square meters of paddy fields.

From ground level, the designs are invisible, and viewers have to climb the mock castle tower of the village office to get a glimpse of the work.

Rice-paddy art was started there in 1993 as a local revitalization project, an idea that grew out of meetings of the village committee.