Nara National Museum

Nara National Museum

奈良国立博物館
Original Museum Building
Established	1889
Location	Nara, Japan
Type	Art museum
Website	http://www.narahaku.go.jp/

The Nara National Museum (奈良国立博物館, Nara Kokuritsu Hakubutsukan^?) is one of the pre-eminent national art museums in Japan.

The Nara National Museum is located in Nara, which was the capital of Japan from 710 to 784. Katayama Tōkuma (1854–1917) designed the original building, which is a representative Western-style building of the Meiji period and has been designated an Important Cultural Property in Japan. Junzō Yoshimura (1908–1997) designed a supplemental building in 1973.

The museum is noted for its collection of Buddhist art, including images, sculpture, and altar articles. The museum houses and displays works of art belonging to temples and shrines in the Nara area. Properties kept in the Shōsōin repository are exhibited each year in the autumn.

In the museum's collection is the 12th-century Hell Scroll (Nara National Museum) (地獄草紙^?), 11th or 12th-century mandala Jōdo mandara-zu, and the 9th-century sculpture of the seated Buddha Yakushi.

The Nara National Museum was established in 1889 as the Imperial Nara Museum (帝国奈良博物館). The Nara National Museum held its first exhibition in 1895. As prehistory to the opening, there was a Nara exhibition. In 1874, Nara exhibition company of semi-governmental management was established by the then Nara governor Fujii Chihiro. The Museum was renamed the Imperial Household Museum of Nara. It has been known by its present name since 1952.