Larry’s Pretty Good Journal

I'm back from Origami USA 2014, three days of folding and more folding in New York. It was, indeed, interesting to see how that fandom is similar to and different form SF, anime, and comics fandoms. Because all participants are being in some measure artistic/creative, the line between creators and consumers is much more blurry. As symbol of this, the hospitality area was a large hall filled with tables, where everyone congregated when not in a session -- folding, socializing, networking, teaching each other models and techniques, all activities that also blur together.

A very strong ethos of sharing and teaching other. Passing it on. Yes, SF writers do this, but teaching is the fundamental interaction between folders. Also: many, many children. Roughly twice as many boys as girls, but the proportions were roughly the same for both pre-teens and teens. Adults, roughly equal men and women -- it was hard to judge exactly, as the non-participating guardians for younger children were overwhelmingly mothers rather than fathers.

Speaking of teaching, I attended formal sessions for learning six models, which I will share via photos -- only one of these has published diagrams, and two were taught by someone other than the designer. As always, clicky embiggens.

First was Robert Lang (I'd already fanboyed at him the night before) and his wonderfully round cat:



A howling timber wolf by Paul Frasco, which is rather flexible as to posture -- I did it close to how he exhibits it:



John Szinger's foxy fox, with bonus fox because I folded two at the same time:



Nathan Zimet's hummingbird -- speaking of young folders, he's in his early teens.



Joseph Wu's owl -- which both did not come out neatly and photographed blurrily, oops:



Dennis Walker's Cabbage Rose Kusadama #2, taught by Doug Caine. We did not come close to finishing this during the 2-hour class -- it took me 5.5 more hours of work (plus some glue and cussing -- more cussing than glue) to finish:



It was worth the work. By the time I'd done as much as I had, I had kinda gotten obsessed. (If you're at this sort of convention, there is a very good chance you have obsessive tendencies. Several people admitted they would have gotten just as obsessed if they had started this.) And now that I've learned how and where to NOT apply the glue, the next time it'll come out better.

I did other folding, including several models from John Montroll's new book of mythological creatures, but that's for a post some other time.

Oh, but I do have to share this one photo from the exhibit hall: "witch girl" by Mitsugu Otani:



I think Studio Ghibli fans can supply names to that witch and that cat. And all of us, several superlative adjectives to the designer for folding this from a single (very large) square of paper.

---L.

Subject quote from "Atalanta in Calydon," Algernon Charles Swinburne.