Museum of Modern Art, Saitama

A short walk from the west exit of Kitaurawa Station, inside leafy Kitaurawa Park, a square building with a lattice-like facade comes into view. The Museum of Modern Art, Saitama, nicknamed MOMAS, opened on November 3, 1982. It was designed by architect Kisho Kurokawa and was the first museum building he ever created. Together with a stroll through the park, it offers architecture and art in a single visit.

The museum's roots go back to the Saitama Prefectural Museum of Art, which opened in 1957 beside Bessho Pond. The old museum effectively closed in 1966, and the present building was built in Kitaurawa Park, on the former site of the old Urawa High School. Kurokawa is said to have aimed for "symbiosis" between building and park while carrying on the memory of the school.

The collection centers on modern art from Saitama and the Japanese and international works that influenced it. Its highlight is Claude Monet's "Haystacks at Giverny, Sunset," bought in 1981, the year before opening, and used on the poster for the opening exhibition. There are works by Saitama-linked Western-style painters such as Tanaka Tamotsu, Saito Hosaku, Saito Yori and Morita Tsunetomo, by Eikyu, who kept a studio in Urawa, by Komura Settai, born in Kawagoe, as well as Suda Kokuta and Saeki Yuzo, along with Renoir, Picasso, Utrillo and Fujita Tsuguharu.

What sets this museum apart is that visitors can freely sit on famous design chairs inside. Between galleries you can rest on well-designed chairs, which has earned it the nickname "the museum of chairs." The building also houses an art library, a museum shop and a restaurant.

There is plenty to see outside as well. Outdoor sculptures are scattered through the park, including Hashimoto Masayuki's "Work 115: Membrane of Motion (Inner Waterside)." A capsule model from Kurokawa's famous Nakagin Capsule Tower also stands in the park, which architecture fans will not want to miss.

Allow about an hour for the permanent MOMAS Collection, or around two hours with a special exhibition. Special exhibitions are priced individually, and a special exhibition ticket also admits you to the MOMAS Collection. There is no dedicated parking, so arriving by train is recommended. Nearby are the Mint Museum Saitama (about 2.7 km), Musashi Ichinomiya Hikawa Shrine (about 5.4 km) and the Railway Museum (about 6.2 km).