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Everyday Scenes from a Parallel World

Everyday Scenes from a Parallel World

Posted on 23 Aug 2020

As a fairly avid artbook collector, and a keen fan of architecture, Everyday Scenes from a Parallel World is an utter gift from PIE International, the company that has steadily been releasing some of the finest artwork in Japan to hungry fans in the West.

This latest tome collects background illustrations and scenes from anime and manga works, but that dry description barely does the book justice. 

Fans of Makato Shinkai in particular will find much to love here, with Torrocchi's On a Starry Night recalling 5 Centimetres Per Second, Natsu's Color reminiscent of Your Name and Ko-Ki Ikegami's View of a Finished Drawing perfectly encapsulating the spirit of Weathering With You. That's not to say that everything is beautiful sky-filled vistas - Umishima Senbon (who has her own dedicated artbook, Bouquet of a Thousand Flowers which I have also covered) provides a work called An Angel's Alley which brought to mind Haibane Renmei. 

Emergency Stairs by Akima
Emergency Stairs by Akima was created for this book - the vertigo-inducing skyscrapers are stunning

When not finding illustrations that remind you of other works, there are those that just enthral, moments in time perfectly captured and evoking a curiosity for the characters and situations they present to the viewer. Shunshi Katahira's New Growth shows a ramshackle building covered in nature, a young girl emerging and locking eyes with a passing white cat. It feels like the beginning of a story we'll never know, and it's both beautiful and heartbreaking at the same time. 

For those who want grander vistas, fear not. Kigumo KIsara presents dazzlingly busy city vistas rich in detail and complexity, with traditional structures stretching into bridges across the sky. Asano creates bustling towns with characters strewn across multiple levels and planes, each person living their own adventure - Narihira Bridge is almost too much to take in, like a Where's Wally book it's just so rich in expression and life that you could stare at it for an hour and still miss some delightful happenstance hidden amongst the busy streets. 

Narihira Bridge by Asano
Just a fraction of Asano's insanely wonderful Narihira Bridge

The book goes a step beyond simply printing artwork, it also delves into the creative process, making it an invaluable resource for budding artists. The subtle differences between Mocha's rough draft and final illustration of the piece Burn into Memory shows the layers of detail an artist adds between drafts. The cover illustration for the book is painstakingly broken down across 10 pages, showing the detail in every facet of the artwork. Yoshida Seiji's process, covering everything from architectural detail to human and animal development is nothing short of inspirational, even if the descriptions haven't been translated (boo!).

Whether you're a fan of Japanese culture and love the distinctive look of the country, or a fan of fantastical other worlds, you have both right here, distinct from each other in some works, mixed together gloriously in others. This is what you leave on the coffee table when you want your imagination opened to the possibility of other worlds that are tantalisingly close to this one.

Less a book, and more a gateway to the fantastical, it is absolutely stunning in every respect. It's never far from my desk, begging me to open a page at random.

I am thrilled to oblige whenever I can.

This book was purchased from Amazon (this is not an affiliate link).

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