The Colourful Restorations of Yakushiji Temple, Nara

Sometimes, when ancient things are restored or reconstructed, we feel a sense of inauthenticity in them. In such cases, bar those of ineptly administered attempts (this Italian painting perhaps the most famous), this is because we are enlivened by the sense of unfamiliarity of a past that has lingered into a present where it doesn’t belong. Aged statues with fissions, cracks, missing parts and peeling pigments, and buildings in ruins: these convey glimmers of what has been lost, glimpses of a one-glorious past. And this is why conservators must strike a careful balance that provides a sense of the past with the maintenance of the passage of time, while exerting as little interference into the structure and appearance of any object or building in the interests of material preservation. I enjoyed this balance at Yakushiji recently, the grand Buddhist temple dating back to the start of the city as a capital, that sits in the quiet neighbourhood of Nishinokyo.

Yakushiji is a seventh century temple dedicated to the Medicine Buddha and it has been undergoing extensive restoration since the 1970s up to the present day – to a gleaming (and in places, flawless) extent. For example, the canopy above Miroku Nyorai in the Kodo Hall, is brightly painted in colours we don’t normally see in temples today, and its vividness means that we don’t tentatively touch the past though its damaged remains but are plunged into it directly. There are clearly delineated karakusa (winding plant) patterns in bright orange, oxblood, deep cerulean blue, and bright white on little triangles that encircle the canopy and are filled in with dots and circles.

These are the same colours found in the beaded, wooded, net-like fringe of the canopy, with gold tear-drop baubles weighting the end of each netted tassle. It is fresh, and loyal to its predecessors. Some of the statues are relatively new, too. Among others, Jinja Daisho is one. Made in the Meiji period (early twentieth century) he expresses the appearance and spirit of the older models – he is a demonic protector of Buddhism, a small and stocky figure adorned in the heads and skins of those he has conquered: a small face in his stomach, leopard print skirt and shorts with elephant heads for hems, and a necklace of human skulls.

The temple complex as a whole is quite spacious and much of the newness creates a sense that one has gone back in time, especially since it is located in a very quiet area – it seems to bear a heavy, expectant silence as if the place is about to come back to life in the height of its flourishing. The Yakushi Triad (Yakushiji’s principal icon) and the Kannon Bodhisattva (seventh century) are well worth coming to see, as are many of the medieval statues in the subsidiary halls. The old and the new co-exist well at Yakushiji, and the restoration of many of its buildings should not be regarded as a loss of the originals, but as an ode to its determination to maintain the old, and as an evocative demonstration of good restoration. It has a beautiful English/Japanese website too – here.

Yakushiji Temple

457 Nishinokyocho,Nara City,
Nara Prefecture, 630-8563

Admission 
9:00 AM to 5:00 PM
(Reception closes at 4:30 PM.)

Admission Fees (there are group discounts)

Adult: 1000 yen

Junior/Senior High School Student: 600 yen

Elementary School Student: 200 yen

By train: From Kintetsu Nara, take the Kintetsu-Nara Line from Nara to Yamato Saidaiji. Change to the train headed for Kashihara Jingu Mae and get off at Nishinokyo station. Yakushiji Temple is just steps away from the station.

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