Yamadera Basho Memorial Museum
The Yamadera Basho Memorial Museum is a biographical museum in Yamagata, Japan. It is located near the Yamadera temple, where poet Matsuo Bashō visited in 1689 during his travels that were chronicled in Oku no Hosomichi.
The museum primarily chronicles Bashō's life and his contributions to the literary style of haiku.
Overview
In 1989, Yamagata celebrated its 100-year anniversary, which coincided with the 300-year anniversary of Bashō's visit to Yamadera. The museum was opened on July 9, as part of a cultural building boom.Just outside Yamadera Station on the Senzan Line, it sits on the south side of the steep river valley, facing Yamadera to the north with a scenic view of the temple.
Many writings by Bashō, and literati and artists from his time and later, are regularly displayed. Special exhibitions on related themes are also regularly mounted in the gallery.
The facility includes many traditional Japanese style meeting rooms and tea rooms used for tea ceremonies and other cultural programs, including seminars on literature and haiku taikai poetry writing contests, in both Japanese and English. The buildings in traditional sukiya-zukuri tea ceremony room style were designed by architect Masao Nakamura.