Children with Yellow Umbrellas

In Chihiro’s illustrations, one hardly notices the ground, but when the scene is of a rainy day, it is a different story. Wet roads and puddles become mirrors, faintly reflecting the surrounding colors, such as those of the children’s rain boots and umbrellas. Chihiro loved the transparency of watercolors, saying, “The quality of watercolors is so wonderful; they simply melt in water.” We can assume that a scene of a rainy day must have been the ideal theme for the artist to make use of the unique characteristics the medium offered. In this illustration Chihiro rhythmically arranged the yellow umbrellas of different sizes and positioned at different angles to convey the liveliness of the children playing in the rain.