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Virtual tour:Goethe Courtyard

ゲーテの庭

This courtyard is abundant in nature, including double cherry blossoms, satsuki azaleas, Japanese hydrangeas, waxyleaf nightshades and Japanese maples. The name for the courtyard originates from the Goethe poem, Gefunden, which is inscribed on a monument centred in the courtyard. In this poem, the poet finds a pretty flower in the forest and goes to pick it, when the flower laments, “once I am broken away, my fate is to wither,” which leads the poet to take the whole plant home, where it is replanted, grows well and continues to blossom. It gives us an idea of Goethe’s kindness, who was rather inclined to picking pretty flowers from fields. We created this ceramic monument as a reminder of this compassion and how we wish to approach treatment in a compassionate and humanistic manner. The monument was created by Kenji Funaji, in a ceramic style from Fujina in Shimane.

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