Chiisakobee – Die kleine Nachbarschaft

Everything seems so contemplative, so composed – but behind the calm images, disasters lurk.  The parents of carpenter Shigeji have died in a fire. His company and therefore his livelihood have been almost completely destroyed. He must deal with social expectations that he has no desire to fulfil, and has to take responsibility for a group of orphaned children who insist on acting out their hostile feelings. Minetarō Mochizuki (born 1964) has been working as a successful manga artist since 1985. Chiisakobee is his comic-book adaptation of a 1957 novel by Shūgorō Yamamoto. Minetarō moved the old tale of craftsmanship, emotions and empathy into the present and tells of the immutability of values and conflicts. In doing so, he focuses on the details of communal life, regularly highlighting postures, facial expressions, and the ways food is presented in Japanese kitchen culture. The result is an unconventional work that received the award for Best Series in 2017 at the comics festival in Angoulême, France.