In the Creases: Contemporary Origami Art

With the Paper Fashion Show coming up in Denver this Thursday, I thought it a good time to talk about the creases and crimps of that other paper art, origami.

What is it about folding a square of paper that elevates it from classroom distraction to an artform and a science? Practice. And that's what folk artists, fine artists and doctors of mathemetics do the world over to produce staggering origami creations that stretch the bounds of the imagination.    Whether meticulous representations, abstract sculptures, explorations of nature's laws and even paper footballs, origami contains that innate human desire to manipulate the world around us.  With its use of simple materials and inherrent geometric constraints, this discipline can result in staggering transformations that defy expectation and display the powerful possibilities within the limitation of a form.

In the 1950's, the godfather of modern origami, Akira Yoshizawa (above) invented a standardized system for creating complex origami diagrams which allowed origami to become more detailed. His wet-folding technique, in which paper is kept damp during the folding process, resulted in the ability to crimp and curve the paper to give his work surprisingly lifelike features.

Modern artists like Eric Joisel (above) and Satoshi Kamiya (below) have built on Yoshizawa's approach creating ever more intricate and lifelike depictions.

Moving away from reality, artist Paul Jackson created this non representational origami sculpture. He has also begun to explore a minimalism in his 'one fold' work.

MIT Professor of electrical engineering and computer science, Dr. Erik Demaine, creates computational origami with attempt to reveal the mechanism of how pleated paper self folds into specific circular surfaces.  His math sculptures are built on explorations started at the Bauhaus in the 1920's in the classroom of Josef Albers (below)

Artists like Alexis Mérat and Vincent Floderer of Le Crimp incorporate spontaneous elements in their abstract paper sculptures by crunching and deeply wetting paper to create unexpected organic expansions in the drying and unfolding process.