Anno Mitsumasa at Japan House

Illustrator Anno Mitsumasa has been creating beloved children's books with incredible detail and a gentle sense of humour since the 1960s. wonder | wander | women were enthralled by his show Anno's Journey in Japan House this past week.

Courtesy of Japan House

Anno came from a small Japanese town called Tsuwano and worked as a primary school teacher for many years before becoming an illustrator. His children's books are full of his own fond memories: learning to write kanji, making leaf-boats and swimming in the river of his hometown.

His warm curiosity and playful humour infuse his children's books, which are full of hidden jokes and references. This picture book in the style of medieval paintings depicts a world in which things suddenly turn upside down.

Many of Anno's books were inspired by the work of M.C. Escher; Topsie Turvies and Mysterious Pictures were visual puzzles with Escher-like reflections, paradoxes and tricks, all beautifully drawn.

The exhibition space itself was a little playground of these jokes come to life. Abstract wooden sculptures formed Japanese letters with their shadows; distorted paintings set against mirrored pillars became a mask, a bicycle, or a mermaid combing her hair.

The wordless travel books like Anno's Journey and Anno's Britain are perfectly drawn records of European cities and countryside, but they're also thick with in-jokes and references to characters, paintings, and literature that Anno encountered on his journey.

Illustration from Anno's Britain

We loved the game at the back of the exhibition book. Spot the references! Seurat's afternoon on the Grand Jatte, Van Gogh's Pont de Langlois and Toad, Rat and Mole of Wind in the Willows: like a museum episode of Where's Waldo.

As art history nerds and avid readers, how could we resist the chance to spot  Don Quixote charging at windmills or the Beatles playing at Trafalgar Square?

All the time a peaceful soundtrack of crickets and water played, broken by the occasional sound of a passing train. Sitting in the reading space with other Anno fans introducing their children to the master, it was as if we stepped into a world he made just for us.