Sipho Mabona

Sipho Mabona

Title: Peaceful Koi

Media: Paper

Dimensions: 16’x11’x1’

Date: January 2009

   Brief Bio: According to the biography found on his web site mabonaorigami.com,  at the age of 5 Mabona folded his first paper airplane. By the age of 20, the Swiss native had mastered the art of plane folding and taught himself origami. Over a course of 8 years, Mabona evolved into the well known origami master he is today. Since 2008, Mabona has been featured in over 50 exhibits, magazines, and even an award winning Asics corporate movie “Origami in the Pursuit of Perfection”.

   Artists/Critique statement: According to an interview captured in the video “Folding Paper: The Infinite Possibilities of Origami”, Mabona gives a metaphor for life through his origami ventures, “When you come into the world, you are not a finished article. You have to find your own way, to develop and work on yourself”. –Sipho Mabona

   Background on work presented: In an interview by typedesk.com, a typographic desk reference site, Mobana states this particular Koi installation took about 3 months to make. Each Koi is folded from a single sheet of paper. Mabona says also in the interview that the folding is the easy part and each koi only takes an hour or 2 to make. However, it’s the design and placement that takes up the majority of his time.

   How it connects to the theme and why you chose the work: Origami is a major category in the paper craft realm. I chose this installation for its color and motion that make the air into a stream or pond that one might find in a garden.

Rebecca J. Coles

Rebecca J. Coles

Title: The Center of Fiery Skippers

Media: Paper

Dimensions: 5’x5’

Date: 2010

   Brief Bio: According to her web site, rebeccajcoles.co.uk,  Rbecca J. Coles is a UK-based artist that received her Master of Arts degree in Constructed Textiles from the Royal College of Art in 2002. Since 2009, she has been featured in over 60 exhibits all over the world and received the “People’s Choice Award, Black Swan, Frome”.

   Artists/Critique statement: In an article from Period Living Magazine titled “Rebecca J. Coles, Paper Artists”, Coles tells us how she came up with the concept for The Center of Fiery Skippers and similar works “I’ve always enjoyed cutting up paper, and in my sketchbooks I would have sections cut out to reveal other layers. When I graduated I created a look book for magazines to illustrate my textiles and I used paper art as the background design. After a few years spent renovating a house, I returned to that idea and I began to cut out butterfly silhouettes from magazine images that I found interesting; my work has stemmed from that.”

   Background on work presented: Also in the Period Living article, interviewer Naomi Jones tells us this particular installation is in Coles UK home. However, the artwork was originally created and featured for her first show at a popular gallery in Ireland, Origin.
   How it connects to the theme and why you chose the work: What’s a paper garden without paper butterflies? This mesmerizing paper creation is a great example of the power of paper.

Josh Keyes

Josh Keyes

Title: Mist

Media: Paper

Dimensions: 5’x7’x6’

Date: 2008

   Brief Bio:  According to the biography found on his web site, joshkeyes.net, Josh Keyes was born in Tacoma, Washington in 1969. In 1992, Keyes earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Six years later, Keyes received his Masters of Fine Arts degree from Yale and began “exhibiting his work nationally and internationally and has work in private and public collections.”

   Artists/Critique statement: In an online art blog by John Trippe, Trippe interviews Josh Keyes on the subject of Mist, here’s what Keyes had to say about the metamorphosis taking place in Mist “There are certain animals that for me fit an archetypal representation. There is something about the animal, the antlers, the gaze, there is something that I believe strikes a chord with the collective unconscious. It is a stag and yet not a stag, it becomes something more or stands for something else.”

   Background on work presented: According to Josh Keyes web site, this installation was commissioned for a mixed media exhibit by the OKOK Gallery in Seattle, WA.

   How it connects to the theme and why you chose the work: When I think of my paper garden, I think of a vast space rather than a fenced corner of a yard. The presence of this ‘stag’ communicates the wide open space I see in my mind’s eye relating to my garden. It’s just as vast as the use of paper as a medium.

Benja Harney

Benja Harney

Title: Queen Victoria Building Spring Paper Flower Installation

Media: Paper

Dimensions: 40ft high

Date: 2012

   Brief Bio: According to Harney’s web site, paperform.com, Benja Harney is a self taught paper engineer based in Sydney. His love of using paper as a medium reflects his passion for contradiction “strong/delicate_comple/simple.” Through his business, Paperform, Harney has “been dedicated to engineering high-end pop-up books and crisp paper constructions professionally for 6 years”. In January of 2012 he was recognized by the Sydney Music, Art & Culture (SMAC) Awards as Sydney’s Best Visual Artist.

   Artists/Critique statement: In an interview found on thedesignfiles.net, Harney has this to say about paper “I think it has a simplicity that really speaks to us in this modern digital world. It’s like playing and kind of reminds people of childhood I guess. People love to dream about those creative times. Plus, I think people love to see just how creative one can be with a flat piece of paper!”

   Background on work presented: According to Harney’s web site, Paperform.com, his installation was commissioned for the Art and About festival in Sydney, Australia. The installation was accompanied by floral scents placed throughout the work making it ‘interactive’.

   How it connects to the theme and why you chose the work: These amazing paper creations not only take up all the space in the room, but also all the space in my mind when I think of my paper garden. This installation allows you to experience flowers in way reality cannot supply you with. This installation is the heart of my paper garden Mecca.

Yulia Brodskaya

Yulia Brodskaya

Title: Firmenich project

Media: paper

Dimensions: 5’ x 4’

Date: 2009

   Brief Bio: According to her web site, Artulia.com, Brodskaya is a Russian native with a Master of Arts Degree in Graphics Communication from the University of Hertfordshire. Since graduating in 2006, Brodskaya has received over 80 commissions including, advertisements, and has been featured over 50 times in books, articles, and interviews.

   Artists/Critique statement: In an interview found on ScibbleBlog.com, Brodskaya tells Scribble about her work, “I always had a special fascination for paper, I’ve tried many different methods and techniques of working with paper, for instance Origami, paper collages, however Quilling technique turned out to be ‘the one’ for me… I just call them paper artworks; but I don’t normally try to put any labels such as craft or fine art or even focusing on the term ‘quilling’ too much. I use a combination of paper manipulation techniques to create my paper artworks.”

   Background on work presented: According to Brodskaya’s web site, this piece was commissioned by Firmenich, a worldwide fragrance and flavor manufacturer and “is the first in a series of commissions as the company plans to involve a different artist each year to build a collection of artworks inspired by fragrances.”

   How it connects to the theme and why you chose the work: This artwork allows you to get lost in its elegant lines; however, the lines require you to see the forest through the trees, or in this case, the flowers through the lines. The ‘secret’ element in my nod to a classic, The Secret Garden.

Conclusion

   The process of organizing an exhibition of works by various artists is extremely tedious; however, it can also be rewarding if you have a personal interest in the subject of the exhibition. Knowing the specific elements I wanted to portray in my exhibit made this project challenging. There are plenty of photos available on Google that fit my category; but the biggest hurdle for me was finding artists within my qualifications AND with enough information available to meet the requirements of this gallery. I felt like a detective hunting down all the information. This “hurdle” gave me a little insight on the roll notoriety plays in the gallery circuit. It also cues me in on how frustrating and addicting the curators job can be. It’s evident you don’t keep a job as a curator by carelessly throwing things together.
   The part of the process that came naturally was deciding on the quality of work I wanted to show. Each artwork was selected because it embodied my idea of perfect paper crafts. Paper is, by far, an understated medium. I wanted to show the versatility in paper craft techniques and possibly inspire a new artist. This project has taught me that mainstream paper artists are few and far between. There are plenty of paper garden “crafts” accessible on Etsy; however, these artists have yet to break through the underground and very little information, if any, is available regarding them. Most of the artist I featured broke through by being featured in a gallery. More paper artists should reach out to curators in an effort to spread the word that paper is awesome. Somewhere, a curator is pulling their hair out while researching artist to feature in an exhibit, they have all my sympathy.