kyoto kaikan Originally uploaded by pan-o. my hexagonal geometric obsession flipped when I saw this ceiling. Thanks again to pan-o on flickr for yet another beatiful photograph. I think probably 1/3 of my favorites on flickr are his work!
I did some research into Ethan Plaut, and while I didn’t come up with too much here’s some tantalizing tidbits of info. If you have more that you can tell me about Ethan, I would appreciate it! I had no luck discovering his current activities and latest work. You can look at the 4 photos on the link above; or check out some of his photos in the book Origamido, which also features wonderful work from Robert Lang, Paul Jackson, etc. the Origamido store also is selling a video about Ethan’s work, appropriately titled Architectural Origami Design – Building on the Equilateral Triangle: The Many Facets of Ethan R. Plaut. I also tracked down this old collection of photos (some are the same as above) at his university. And lastly, this interesting piece of information, pulled from a Northwestern University pamphlet from 2000: Weinberg junior and College Scholar Ethan Plaut grabbed the attention of USA Today this year with a unique talent for origami, in which he brings together the study of the structural and …
Yiibu » Creative Commons Origami Fortuneteller What surprised me when I first started researching the artform was how it was almost impossible to find un-copyrighted origami patterns. Of course, from a pure copyright law point of view, anything ‘fixed in a tangible medium’ is copyrightable and in many countries, becomes instantly copyrighted upon creation. But legalities aside, I was shocked at the depth of the proprietary movements surrounding origami. Not only were patterns or folds copyrighted, but often so were instructions. While there were ancient origami folds (dubbed ‘traditional’,) that presumably were in the public domain, their representation in books (the teaching of the fold, the photography, diagrams etc.) was copyrighted. The end result being that it was almost impossible to find origami that I could confidently distribute under a Creative Commons license. So here is the best I’ve been able to come up with—a downloadable origami fortuneteller. Instructions included. Just fold on the dotted lines. And in the spirit of things, what better topic than Creative Commons licenses. Amen, sister. You’re not alone in …
Joan Michaels Paque I recently became aware of Joan’s amazing work due to a posting of hers on the Origami-L mailing list. She has a wonderful portfolio of art, crossing many genres and materials, including sculpture, textiles, paper and more. I highly recommend taking at look at her collections online, or in person if you have a chance. She’ll be doing a two-day workshop in early March 2006 in San Francisco, and also a Paper Arts course in Door County, Wisconsin in late July. (a little closer than SF to me, although any excuse to go to SF is a good one in my book.) Her
CITY Magazine: UN_FOLD video CITY Magazine sent out a challenge to 9 designers, asking them to build a chair in 90 days… with one small catch- it had to fit into a Fedex box. Some relatively interesting pleated/unfolding/geometric designs came up as a solution! Watch the video and see. (Quicktime required.)
