We post a lot of strange and bizarre stuff on CVLT Nation, and we post a lot of stuff about Japanese culture, because often the two crossover. Japan pretty much has the market cornered on classy, upscale, homey, professional, and weird. One example of the latter is one of the strangest, most chaotic worlds I’ve ever seen Maboroshi Hakurankai in Ito, Shizuoka, Japan. I guess it’s a museum because it has old things in it. But other than that, the stories and histories it tells are kind of grotesque, disorienting, and terrifying. It’s somewhere I would love to go if I ever make it over to Japan. Check out the gallery of odd images from Maboroshi Hakuranka below…
Maboroshi Hakurankai is a bizarre, retro Japanese museum located in Ito, Shizuoka which is on a completely different level from any museums you have ever been to. From the very first step, you are surrounded by larger-than-life models, which will make your skin crawl, and blow your mind. Starting with the Great Buddha area, it gives you the feeling of visiting a safe and tranquil greenhouse, occupied by interesting mannequins and statues, but as you move on, each room gets progressively weirder.
To give you an idea of what is waiting for your virgin mind by the end of your journey into Maboroshi Hakurankai, one of the rooms is named the Makai Shrine or in other words, “The Shrine to the Demonic World”. There you are confronted with the mind of a depraved artist, and extreme, sexualised artistic expression. According to recent news, the owner is currently in the process of designing a room with the theme of stripping, inspired by the Shōwa period of Japan.
Here’s a museum walkthrough:
