S P O T ／ SPOT-073

Nagoya Daibutsu (Tōgan-ji's Green Buddha)

名古屋大仏（桃巌寺）なごやだいぶつ（とうがんじ）

In a quiet residential temple district in eastern Nagoya, a 10-meter bronze Buddha sits cross-legged in the precincts of Tōgan-ji — and the statue is, unmistakably, bright green. Completed in 1987 in conventional bronze, the Buddha was repainted in 2006 in a vivid leaf-green hue, with the curls of his hair regilded in glittering gold, producing a color combination that no traditional Japanese Buddha had ever attempted. The result has been controversial ever since (some visitors love it; some are appalled), but Tōgan-ji is unbothered: the temple's main historical claim is as the family memorial temple of Oda Nobuhide, father of the warlord Oda Nobunaga, and the green Buddha is only one of several attractions in a precinct that also includes a Sleeping Benten figure, one of Japan's largest wooden temple drums, and various other heterodox treasures. The Nagoya Daibutsu has become, in spite of itself, a beloved local oddity and a frequent subject of social-media photographs — proof that color, applied generously to a sacred image, can guarantee a level of attention that gilt and tradition cannot.