Kamo Cultural Hall Revisited

To start the second leg of my walk along the Izumo 33 Kannon Pilgrimage I took the train to Komonaka Station from where it was a few kilometer walk along the river to where I could rejoin the route where I left it at the end of Day 2.

I passed close by the Kamo Cultural Hall so could not resist stopping in to take some more photos of this strange piece of architecture.

I had been here a couple of times before and a previous post with more photos and details can be found here.

I don't think it is particularly good architecture,.. I detect an influence of Le Corbusier maybe, and local residents dislike it, but it has whimsy, so that cant be a bad thing.

Inside Kamo Culture Hall

Here are a few shots on the inside of the bizarre Kamo Culture Hall up in Kamo, Izumo.

It was opened in 1994 and was designed by Toyokazu Watanabe.

Unfortunately the auditorium itself was locked so I couldnt get any shots of it

Photo of the outside can be found here

Kamo Culture Hall

This is one of the more bizarre buildings I have come across in rural japan, its the Kamo Culture Hall in the small town of Kamo, now part of Unnan Town up in Izumo.

Kamo has a population of about 6,000, and yet has this huge concert hall and conference center. many smaller towns and villages in Shimane have such facilities. Maybe we in Shimane are an especially cultured people, or maybe before the bubble burst japan poured insane amounts of money into useless construction.

There is an element of fantasy in the design, and it also seems to be a mishmash of influences. I must admit that on first viewing from a distance I though it might have been a nuclear power station or some sort of industrial complex.

It was built in 1994 and the architect is Toyokazu Watanabe, not someone I have heard of before, but seems fairly well known for his "Breast House" in Kyoto.

Kamo is in the area of Izumo where the Yamata no Orochi myth is set, and according to the architect this was an influence on his design....