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The mythical Kirin is a noble, gentle creature from ancient times that is said to bring peace, justice and happiness. The Kirin is of hybrid nature, with the head of a dragon, the body and legs of an ox or a deer, covered in scales and clad in fire. Sometimes it is compared to the dragon or to the unicorn, but despite the family resemblance it is really neither but its own kind. It used to be found in the lands around the East China Sea and depending on territory and era, its descriptions and interpretations vary remarkably. Clearly though, nowadays it would be good news if the Kirin could at least be sighted.
So Yuki Jungesblut set out to the East China Sea. Equipped with an unlikely and somewhat displaced travel guide and companion – Lewis Carroll’s grand (nonsense) poem The Hunting of the Snark she circled the sea in the hope to find the mythical Kirin following the ancient routes of trade and exchange between the countries bordering the waters of the East China Sea.
The book Kirin Quest tells the story of this endeavour, and with the Kirin as its leitmotif, it invites the curious reader on a journey between imagination, fiction, and reality connecting diverse worlds and times. The book weaves a web of impressions of a region, of exchange and trade, deities and rocks, nature and culture, East and West, present, pasts and futures.
Like its namesake, the book is hybrid in nature, part travelogue, part artist’s book, part photo book part reading endeavou – and just as much the narrative of a dream of discovering the world as it is the rewriting of a temporary utopia.
It is a project giving space to the human desire to search – for happiness, knowledge, belonging – and to discover, collect, tell and share stories.
Published by Yuki Jungesblut
Softcover
420 pages
163 x 230 mm
ISBN: 9783903334229
