P Jackson

1122: Pearl Anniversary

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30 years ago, the Papermakers & Artists of Queensland (POQ) first formed – in July it was their PEARL anniversary.

As a diverse collective of artists (that allowed me to become a member) we were asked to respond to the notion of “Pearl” to assemble an exhibit of artworks to mark this occasion.

My thoughts, naturally, turned to folding and I was reminded of an organic 3D form I last explored for “The Offering” inspired by the work by legend Paul Jackson.

The idea was simple – using one set of slightly overlapping pleats in one direction, that are then corrugated in the perpendicular direction, you can “tease” dimensionality by “cheating” the overlap with a delicate pull.

Taking a square of trusty Kraft paper, I mocked up a Maquette, pleating and corrugating around a central line, then “MacGyvered” a hinge using simple box-pleating techniques, as I had the notion it should be a “book” of sorts. The hinge mechanism had a natural gutter that allowed me to bind pages securely inside also.

For the production fold, I chose metallicized pearlescent “Terryfoil”, I cut 2x 25cm squares and pleated and corrugated, carefully, then spread the pleats until it achieved the desired curvaceousness.

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798: (248/365) The Elephant In The Room

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In a fit of elephantine existentialism, one must ask an important question: “What makes a good Origami Elephant?”:

This is Paul Jackson’s “One Fold Elephant” – is it a good elephant and how would we know? What are ESSENTIAL characteristics that a model should have to be considered elephantine? Obvious characteristics of an elephant (well, for anyone who has ever actually seen one) could include discernible TRUNK, big(ish) flappy EARS and a big solid BODY. We could visually recognise an elephant with way less information than that so why do we require mind-popping details implicit in super-complex paper renderings of elephants when something much simpler does the job.

Purists would argue that all origami is, in essence, figurative representations of real objects. Thereby origami models are in effect are so many levels of abstraction from the real thing that there are no valid metrics that apply the the “goodnicity” of the rendering. Continue reading →

647: (97/365) Yabbie

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Small, delicious crustaceans abound all over the world, in Australia we have the Yabbie:

Found in freshwater dams, billabongs and rivers, yabbies are treasured as an Australian bush tucker. Continue reading →

642: (92/365) No Luck Involved

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This fold was folded on our 34th wedding anniversary, chosen because a long and happy relationship is not reliant on luck:

This dice is clever is a little obscure – rather than traditional dots each face has a partial coverage of colour.

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238: Daffodil Day

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In Australia, August 26 this year is nominated as “Daffodil Day”:

We celebrate the lives of those brave people who have fought cancer in all it’s forms – to do so we use a flower, the fragile symbol of hope and beauty:

I made a white one, then folded 4 in colour and scattered then strategically around my school. I remembered, if few others did initially. I do this in memory of some dear friends that lost the fight and suffer no more.

A complex and time-consuming fold,  the flower head is dense and made, unusually from a hexagon cut from an A3 sheet, it collapses down to a life-size bloom via some interesting sinking, swivels and squash folds. An interesting (and cathartic) fold designed by Paul Jackson, taken from a book loaned to me by Amanda (thanks @ackygirl)

I hope you remembered Daffodil Day, or at the very least people you know who have been touched by Cancer.