For several years, rice farms in different Japanese prefectures have created stunning crop art by cleverly planting different color rice plants in precise and strategic arrangements grown in their paddy fields.
Farmers creating the huge displays use no ink or dye. 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, a Roman variety, to create the colored patterns in the time between planting and harvesting in September.
The murals in Inakadate cover 15,000 square meters of paddy fields. Rice-paddy art was started there in 1993 as a local revitalization project, an idea that grew from meetings of the village committees. The different varieties of rice plants grow alongside each other to create the masterpieces.
In the first nine years, the village office workers and local farmers grew a simple design of Mount Iwaki every year. But their ideas grew more complicated and attracted more attention. In 2005, agreements between landowners allowed the creation of enormous rice paddy art. A year later, organizers used computers to precisely plot planting of the four differently colored rice varieties that bring the images to life.
The first 7 photos below show the time line from planting to fruition.
The next photo is a Sengoku warrior on horseback and has been created from hundreds of thousands of rice plants. The colors are created by using different varieties. This photo was taken in Inakadate, Japan.
Next, we have Napoleon on horseback as can be seen from the skies. This was created by precision planting and months of planning by villagers and farmers located in Inkadate, Japan.
Finally, here is fictional warrior Naoe Kanetsugu and his wife, Osen. Their lives are featured on the Japanese television series Tenchijin and these images appear in fields in the town of Yonezawa in the Yamagata prefecture of Japan.
I just wanted to share this with you because I love Japan.
