Between April 23 and 30, 2024, we invited fifty people from across Japan to send us receipts they happened to have in their wallets, knowing that these would become part of an artwork.
On May 1, we officially registered our marriage. What had been an ordinary date on the calendar became a special day for us. In France, where we had become engaged, May 1 is also known as La Fête du Muguet, the day of the lily of the valley.
From each envelope we received, we selected a single receipt, choosing the one we imagined might be most easily forgotten or thrown away. We wrapped it with great care and sent it back to its original owner, together with a photograph of groceries we had bought at the supermarket in France where we got engaged.
For us, that day had acquired a particular meaning. For the people who sent us their receipts, the pieces of paper were ordinary traces of their everyday lives. We wondered what might happen if something so easily discarded were returned to its owner with the care usually given to a gift.
We did not want to ask anyone to treasure a receipt, nor did we wish to declare that everything in everyday life is beautiful. The receipt itself had not changed. It still recorded the same purchases, made on an unremarkable day. What had changed was the journey it had taken, passing through someone else's hands before finding its way home.
Perhaps nothing would change for the person receiving it. They might throw it away the following day. But perhaps, for a brief moment, something that had once seemed insignificant might appear a little different.
Through this small exchange, we wanted to share something that could not quite be put into words. Not a lesson or a message to be understood, but a feeling carried through an ordinary object and a simple act of care.
If even a trace of that experience remained with someone, that would have been enough.
