Q1: The work of picture book authors and curators is very creative. Picture book author and curator are very creative professions. Have you had the initiative to create since your childhood? Can you talk about your experience and what made you start to create picture books and become a curator?
I have loved drawing pictures and writing stories or poems since I was a child. My mother and older brother were book lovers, so I grew up surrounded by books of all kinds. I enjoyed creating both picture books and comic books as part of my play.
It wasn't until I was about 20 years old that I became aware of them as my own work. After graduating from university, I first became involved in making books as an editor. In my late 20s, after my child was born, I opened a picture book BUNKO (home library) at home and enjoyed reading and lending picture books to babies and toddlers.
Since I could not make a living from the home library, I found a job advertisement in the newspaper and applied for the Chihiro Art Museum, and I found a new job as a curator specializing in picture books. Seven years later, I became a freelancer.
Q2: Where do you think illustrators keep a steady stream of creative "nutrients" coming from?
From everything we see, hear, touch, feel, think and experience every day. I hope we can always keep an open mind and not be afraid to be influenced by the words and works of others.
Q3: What has impressed you as a critic in recent years?
There are so many, but I will list three picture books that come to mind quickly:
Adrien Parlange . Les printemps . (2022, La Partie FRANCE)
Gita Wolf, Tushar Vayeda, Mayur Vayeda . SEED . (2023, Tara Books INDIA)
Sydney Smith “Do You Remember?” (2023, Holiday House Publishing US)
Q4: How did you develop your own style of writing picture books?
I am not an illustrator, but as an author and translator, I try to keep my style as flexible as possible. Each person has many different aspects. I want to create various works by making the most of each element. Even though I think so, it is the individuality that seeps out.
Q5: Do you have any habits or rules in your daily creation that you can share?
Unfortunately, I don't have much to recommend. It's abstract, but I should not force myself to conclude and clean up what I don't understand or disagree with. I say to myself, keep thinking. That's why I'm constantly cluttering things inside and outside myself.
Q6: How do you think the visual picture (the illustrator's job) and the word writer's work balance each other?
The balance differs from book to book. The interesting thing about picture books is that the pictures and the text are not separate from each other; rather, something new is created when the two intersect.
