Issa Watababe, Peruvian author, wins international award for her book “Kintsugi”

In the 15th century, legend has it, shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa’s most prized ceramic bowl was broken into pieces. Given the loss of the invaluable object, its immediate repair was ordered. However, when trying to return it to its original state, the piece underwent an irreversible transformation that showed, through golden lines that covered the cracks, its previous breakup and subsequent reunification.

Based on this Japanese pottery technique that consists of repairing objects with a mixture of resin and precious metals such as gold, silver or platinum, it gets its name from “Kintsugi”, a book by Issa Watanabe that explores topics such as loss, acceptance of fragility and constant transformation, while philosophical currents are present such as wabi-sabi, which focuses on capturing beauty in imperfection, mottainai, which is the feeling of regretting when something is wasted, and mushin, which has to do with the principle of accept the change.

“The initial idea arose when I lived in Mallorca and my father died. At that time I received a box where he kept things from my childhood, when I saw that I realized that the objects that one leaves can represent the absence, but at the same time, the presence of someone.”Watanabe mentions in an interview with El Comercio.

However, three years ago the project would take shape after beginning to capture in images the ideas that appeared fleetingly. “I didn’t do it with the intention of making sketches, they were more like loose images that wanted to communicate something to me, after that what I wanted to say only appeared. “This was an inverse process to what I usually have, where I create the images from a script”explains Watanabe

Putting the pieces together

In 2021, the artist won the Llibreter Prize in the Illustrated Album category with her work “Migrantes”, a book that, without words, narrates with images of extraordinary force the journey of a group of animals that leaves behind a nocturnal forest that lacks of leaves. It is the story of a great and unique migration, a journey of uncertainty where death and hope coexist.

Three days ago, Issa Watanabe achieved another recognition, after his work “Kintsugi” was recognized as Best Fiction in the recent edition of the BolognaRagazzi Awards, one of the most important ceremonies in the field of world children’s literature that takes place each year and this time it had 3,355 titles presented by editors from 65 countries.

“The editor submitted the book for this award, I didn’t know it had been submitted, but he called me three days ago and told me I had won. It was very surprising, it didn’t occur to me that a more abstract, poetic and textless book could win such an award.”, comments the artist, who reminds her of what happened with her work “Migrantes.” “Betting on books of this type is not easy for fairs, awards and not for me either, because I am scared and feel insecure about the result, but it is always pleasant to have my work valued in that way”he adds.

The illustrator’s future plans will be to participate in various fairs in Mexico, Brazil, Colombia and other parts of the world. In addition to leaving solo projects for a while to collaborate with a writer, currently unknown, with whom she is working on three new projects. “I like to make these types of bets in children’s literature, to stop being condescending to children, to be more open and honest, trusting their own interpretation.””, he concludes.