shashasha

Five years have passed since the release of Yasushi Mori’s photobook “Hey Hattori,” in which he chronicled his daily life with Hattori, a cat he adopted from the disaster-stricken Futaba in Fukushima Prefecture. Since then, Mori’s family has grown; he has two children now. And Hattori is slowly growing old.

In “Dear Hattori,” Mori captures his life together with Hattori. Rather than an indulgement in feline cuteness, Mori’s series — photographed in soft, warm colors — portrays the cat like an equal, like a person, like a family member. Together with Hattori, we watch after Mori’s wife and two children as they walk to a nearby park, spend a lazy afternoon on the futon, or watch the moon rise over Tokyo.

“Hattori and I are unable to talk to each other. But that is exactly why I can let the emotions I feel come and go in the part of my heart that is like an empty space. Once in a while, when I look at Hattori, I can see myself in him more clearly than I would in my own child.
Life with its unexpected twists and turns is fleeting and soon gone. Joy and sorrow, overhwleming emotions flow through the heart and disappear in an instant. I want to continue capturing in photographs the dearness that his eyes reflect and is left to drift away.”
― from Yasushi Mori’s afterword (included in Japanese & English)