Chihiro’s Picture Books

In the late 1960s, the focus of Chihiro's work shifted from picture magazines to picture books. It represented a move from “narrative picture books,” for which Chihiro drew pictures for existing stories, to “original picture books,” for which she drew pictures for original stories. Furthermore, Chihiro continued to develop her own picture books composed of both her own pictures and original text. Throughout her career, Chihiro never ceased to look for new possibilities for expression in picture books. Especially for picture books published from Shiko-sha, she sought to reach readers’ emotions by unfolding the story with pictures, not only the text. In the picture book, Senka no Naka no Kodomotachi (Children in the Flames of War), each scene seems to tell different stories, yet all express one basic theme. She regarded printed picture books as her finished works, and made full use of bold trimming, composition, zooming, and other techniques to compose scenes with the story flow in mind.