Zihan Wei, a Tokyo-based Chinese artist, has released her second photobook, which brings together her two series, "Mitani" and "I Did Nothing Other Than to Tell Them to Smile." In both series, Wei portrays her family – once through the eyes of her cat, Mitani, and then through snapshots of her parents.
According to Wei, an only child, Mitani "fills the void, becoming a vital part of our family of three" since she has moved to Tokyo. In the "Mitani" photographs, Wei uses a cheap Holga camera to capture Mitani's daily life and occasionally snaps photos from cat's-eye level to see the family apartment from Mitani's perspective. "I Did Nothing Other Than to Tell Them to Smile" began when Wei's parents asked her to take their wedding photos – something they had not done in their thirty years of marriage. Here, too, Wei uses the simple, playful aesthetic of a Kodak Brownie camera to photograph her parents shyly holding hands at home, sitting at the kitchen table, helping each other get dressed, and posing together in parks and playgrounds.