INAKADATE, Japan  Nearly two decades ago, Koichi Hanada, a clerk in the village hall, received an unusual request from his superior: find a way to bring tourists to this small community in rural northern Japan, which has rice paddies and apple orchards, but not much else.

Mr. Hanada, a taciturn but conscientious man, said he had spent months racking his brain. Then, one day he saw schoolchildren planting a rice paddy as a class project. They used two varieties of rice plants, one with dark purplish stalks and the other bright green ones. Then it struck him, why not plant the colored varieties in such a way as to form words and pictures?

“I didn’t know it would become such a hit,” he said.

The result was what is now called paddy art, and it has put this village on the map. Every year since 1993, villagers have created pictures by using rice paddies as their canvas and living plants as their paint and brush. As the village’s creations have grown increasingly large, complex and polychrome, they have drawn growing media attention and hordes of the curious.

Last year, more than 170,000 visitors clogged the narrow streets of this quiet community of 8,450 mostly older residents, causing traffic jams and waiting for hours to see the living art.