I Am A Lone Monk Walking The World With A Leaky Umbrella: Chinese Shadow-puppets 2012-2017

Serge Onnen's I Am A Lone Monk Walking The World With A Leaky Umbrella documents twenty-one shadow-puppets the artist produced with Chinese craftsmen between 2012 and 2017, made in a folk tradition fading fast under China's rapid modernization.

Shadow puppet theatre, semi-transparent leather figures moved on sticks behind a lit screen, is among the oldest forms of projected moving image, and spread from its Chinese origins across Asia over centuries. Onnen traveled to China to research the craft and work directly with its remaining practitioners, producing puppets inspired by current global events rather than traditional folklore. The 184-page softcover book reproduces the puppets alongside short bilingual notes, in Chinese and English, on each figure, with Chinese numerology informing the book's structure. Text is contributed by Shuyu Chen.

The project extended beyond the book: the related film Cloacinae premiered at Rotterdam International Film Festival in 2017 and continued to travel the festival circuit. Onnen, a Netherlands-based artist and illustrator, works across drawing, film and craft-based collaboration reflecting a recurring interest in vanishing image technologies.