MIT origami masters at Fuller Craft Museum
18.05.12
The show kicks off with an origami version of that scene: Two men, a podium, a lamp on the podium, a book, a hammer. Fingers! Hats! All folded from a single sheet of paper. It’s a jaw-dropping proposition (even if the lamp looks more like a takeout container), as many of the works here are. Origami artists belong in that particular phylum of art makers whose art is characterized by obsessive finesse.
Brian Chan designed the model for “Mens et Manus’’ and worked with Ken Stone to make this version, which stands formally in a plastic and wood box that sports the seal’s circle and motto on the front. Etched on the rear face is Chan’s crease pattern, a map of all the folds he makes on his square sheet to create the piece.
If you’re curious, he has posted a video at www.techtv.mit.edu, cheekily titled “How to Fold the MIT Logo in Origami in 3 Easy Steps.’’ The steps, essentially, are: crease, fold, and set. He sets the small, flappy paper sculpture with a methyl cellulose solution and holds it together to dry with binder clips. The entire process takes 10 hours.
Source: Boston Globe