El Foldo
Origami is the centuries-old Japanese art of paper-folding that I took up spontaneously about 10 minutes ago while listening to a sound bite of John Boehner threatening to repeal the recently-passed health care legislation.
I call my first creation “snowball”.
Superficially, this might refer to the snowball’s chance in hell that Boehner has of repeal. At another level, it evokes the chaotic cacaphony of Boehner’s brain. But at root it’s a paradox. Origami turns a two-dimensional material into three dimensions, while Boehner and his ilk turn three-dimensional ideas into two dimensions or one — or none.
Thus the key to successful origami, with all its intricate folds, is patience. Most especially, you must patiently refrain from deciding what exactly you’re sculpting until you have finished folding, studied the resulting wad, and determined what it most closely resembles — an egret, a crane, a backhoe, a Lotus, a Lexus, a kamikaze.
Here is my second origami project, my magnum opus, which practically made itself during a follow-up news segment about a tea party rally. Ladies and gentlemen, the Venus of Willendorf.
The original was made 23,000 years ago, when tea party ideas were at their zenith. My new interpretation shows how far they’ve come.
(Imagine how disappointed I’d have been if I’d stubbornly set out to do an egret. Patience.)
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In fairness to the primitives of Willendorf, they not only lacked your refinement of technique, they were living at a time long before the invention of trailer trash, which obviously served as some part of your inspiration.
Comment by Al — March 27, 2010 @ 7:51 pm
Brilliant! A true artistic display of how the origami screams to be released from the paper through an energetc series of random compressions. And “Snowball,” a masterpiece of introspection, complexity in simplicity and creative ferocity. Bravo!
Comment by Lynn — March 29, 2010 @ 4:22 pm
By jove, you’re right! Someone should be following that genius lady around and collecting her Kleenexes.
Comment by Monmouth — March 29, 2010 @ 6:31 pm
Is that pronounced the Venus of Willendorf or the Weenus of Villendorf?
The Kennedys used to play a game in which someone would give an answer and then everyone tried to think of what the question might be. One of the answers was 9W. The question: “Do you spell your name with a V Mr. Wagner?”
Comment by Al — March 30, 2010 @ 9:23 pm
I’d recognize your crumple anywhere.
Comment by Steve Alber — March 31, 2010 @ 9:20 am