An excerpt from AllThatsInteresting -
Haunting Photos Of Nagoro, The Japanese Village Where The Dead Are Replaced With Life-Size Dolls
Artist Tsukimi Ayano has made at least 400 dolls to repopulate the dwindling village of Nagoro
By Erin Kelly | Edited By Jaclyn Anglis
The streets in the tiny village of Nagoro, Japan are far from bustling. In fact, things are remarkably still. Then, through the corner of your eye, you see a figure — then a group of figures huddled together.
Then you realize they're everywhere you look.
But these aren't people. They're actually life-size dolls — and they make up most of Nagoro's population. The dolls outnumber humans by a ratio of more than ten to one.
The handmade dolls are one woman's attempt to fill the loneliness that exists in Nagoro. This small village becomes increasingly void of people as time goes on. The elderly die and the young people leave for city jobs. Not even a local grocery store remains open.
The village, also called Kakashi No Sato, or Scarecrow Village, is not unlike other rural areas in Japan facing this depopulation trend. Since 2010, the nation has lost about 1.4 million of its people — and it's having a major impact on both the economy and society.
However, here in Nagoro, it's like no one has left; each doll seems to contain the soul of a departed villager. A local official told one tourist that "the figures have even been added to the census records of the village, with detail descriptions of each figure."
In this way, it really does seem like the dolls have a larger-than-life presence in the village of Nagoro.
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| Several dolls sit lined on a bench. KAZUHIRO NOGI/AFP via Getty Images |
