花子

Imamura Hanako is a twenty-two-year old girl with severe autism who lives in Yamazaki in Kyoto Prefecture. Once a week she attends a painting class, where she paints bold pictures in oils. In another vein, though, every evening after dinner she also continues to create the works that her mother, Chisa, has named “food art.” This may only involve arranging the leftovers from the day’s meal on the floor or a tray, but Hanako’s mother records the works every day, so that there are now some thousands of photographs that have been accumulated. This collection of photographs has been exhibited around the country, and has begun to receive the attention of professional artists. By focusing on Hanako, following her daily life in the routine of the four members of the Imamura family, we see the portrait of the family “unfolded” to us. And so to this day, Hanako continues creating on the floor what some unknown person called her “discerning art.”