Shotaro Kitada uses paper puppetry to make his comical vignettes

Using paper in an array of colours, Shotaro Kitada creates 3D scenes and figures alike: walkways lined with shops, crowds of people mid-demonstration and festive living rooms. Shotaro animates a lot of his work, though he’s keen to set something straight – while many people mistake his work for stop-motion, it is in fact a form of puppetry. A feat of innovation, he uses string and motors as a way of achieving an “awkward, not so perfect” style.

His work is full of moments of humour and levity (see a poor paper figure with their tongue stuck to the pole of an icy stop sign) and he often conjures scenes that many will relate to. For example, in his first solo exhibition this year, Moving is Tiring, he tried to conjure the “ideal” house moving situation, to contrast his own, which was (as it is for many) “troublesome and difficult”. Funny, charming and inventive, Shotaro shows that there’s no limit to the potential of a good old sheet of paper.