Later, There Were Many Yesterdays
Currently in development
Later, There Were Many Yesterdays is a picture book project exploring the quiet cultural life of traditional folk toys.
Once part of everyday childhood, these objects were made by anonymous makers using simple materials such as paper, clay, and fabric. They carry within them gestures of care, imagination, and local ways of seeing the world. Over time, many of these objects have disappeared from daily life, leaving only fragments across memory, collections, and archives.
Images
Set in the late twentieth century, the book moves between past and present, imagining these toys not as fixed historical artefacts, but as living forms that continue to shift across contexts. The project is partly inspired by the work of Li Cunsong, a collector and researcher who dedicated his life to documenting Chinese folk toys. Despite experiencing loss during a period of historical upheaval, he continued to preserve and reinterpret these objects, later donating much of his collection to public institutions in Japan.
Images
Rather than presenting these toys as cultural relics, the book approaches them through image and atmosphere. It invites readers to encounter them as carriers of memory, emotion, and ordinary creativity, allowing cultural traces to be felt rather than explained.
The project is currently in development and open to collaboration with publishers.
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