How a trinity of tiny islands
in Japan became the art
world’s destination du jourBy NICOLAS NIARCHOSOn the island of Na-
oshima, in the Seto
Inland Sea – where
the Sea of Japan
meets the Pacific – art devotees
from all over the world venture on
21st-century pilgrimages. Right
now, the island is flush with visitors,
here as a precursor to Art Basel
Hong Kong, spending the weekend
looking at art before they spend a
week selling it the following Monday.
They are drawn to the concrete art
museums that nestle among the
archipelago’s exotic flora and fauna
and to the colourful constellations
of outdoor artworks, which are
striking against the hazy blue back-
drop of the ocean.
It wasn’t always this way: until the
Eighties, Naoshima was a byword
for waste dumping by the local
mafia. In the latter half of the decade,
the billionaire Soichiro Fukutake
undertook a massive conservation
project, building, replanting and
rebranding the island. These days,
rapt viewers from around the world
in fleeces and windbreakers shuffle
around at the direction of museum
staff, silently appreciating a James
Turrell here, cooing in front of a
giant Walter De Maria there. The
bus wends its way up a hill past a
giant yellow pumpkin sculpture by
Yayoi Kusama and draws to a halt
under an impressive concrete porti-
co, tendrils of ivy hugging its under-side. We have arrived at Benesse
House, Naoshima’s main hotel and
for those who consider themselves
flush with fashion (in the art world
at least), the only place to stay. The
fleeces of the bus-taking tourists
must be tailored with very deep
pockets, as there’s even a helipad
tucked away for the most important
hotel VIPs, including Qatari sheiks,
Japanese industrialists and leading
lights of Silicon Valley.
‘We had to pull all kinds of
strings,’ a couple of critics from
New York tell me, as they give me a
tour of their room in the Oval, a
series of six suites arranged in an
ellipse around a fountain, accessible
only via a private funicular.
Benesse House is a glorious place
to stay. The building overlooks the
misty waters of the Inland Sea. It is
designed, as many of the island’s art
facilities are, by the starchitect
Tadao Ando. Here there are two
restaurants, both of which must be
booked in advance – dining in the
upper one, which is located inside
the hotel’s art museum, is rather a
magical experience; it’s not often
one can spend the after-hours in a
museum contemplating works by
Nauman, Hockney, Giacometti,
while feasting on Wagyu beef and
lightly battered tempura prawns.
The rooms are simple and elegant,
and mine has a photograph of a
water tower by the conceptual art
duo Bernd and Hilla Becher.
Naoshima’s best museum, though,
is the Chichu (also make sure to
book or risk standing in a grim-asiamajorlooking queue). A friend who works
in the arts told me, with tears in her
eyes, that it was perhaps the greatest
museum she’s ever visited: a concrete
carapace beautifully jigsawed into a
hilltop by Ando. It features a stun-
ning room of Monets and a portal-
esque Turrell into which guests are
encouraged to wander.
The next morning, I wake with
the rising sun in order to hurry
around the houses in the fishing
town of Honmura – where wooden
huts have been converted into pieces
of art. One can only imagine what
the almost comically stone-faced
locals make of all the art world char-
acters who come here. I spy another
Turrell: this one a dark room in
which shapes of light gradually ap-
pear, which will be familiar to lovers
of the artist’s ‘St Elmo’s Breath’
installation at Houghton Hall. Today
there is no wind and the Cafe Kon-
ichiwa, a tiny place that appears to
have fallen out of the Seventies, is
open. I feast on waffles and ice
cream, before speeding across the
morning water in a ferry towards the
next island of Teshima. Its grey peaks
rise above cushions of mist.
The island is sleepy, quiet and
filled with Benesse-sponsored art. I
rent a semi-electric bicycle and
rocket towards the hills, until I
reach the Teshima Art Museum. It
isn’t really a museum, rather it’s a
single artwork called ‘Matrix’ by Rei
Naito that was built by the architect
Ryue Nishizawa: a large concrete
shell whose roof is open to the
sky. Inside, beads of water trickle
through the porous floor, forming
rivulets that run across the concrete
to depressions in the ground. So
powerful is Naito’s artwork that a
handful of visitors sit cross-legged
watching the rivulets, with fat tears
rolling down their faces.
Back in the main port and grow-
ing hungry, I spot Aruei, a pint-
sized Italian restaurant. Now, the
Japanese take Italian food very seri-
ously. Tokyo-ites will tell you that
they have the world’s best pizza
restaurants (Italians in Tokyo will
agree sagely and then cough, ‘after
Naples’). Aruei is no exception: it
feels like a sea-shanty all’ Italiano ]112 Tatler August 2019 tatler.comPHOTOGRAPH: SETOUCHI TRIENNALI/JAPAN GUIDE08-19TRAVEL-Main.indd 112 11/06/2019 16:47