Paper Art

Most people think of paper as a blank canvas – to be covered and filled and colored with

your hearts’ desire.  But there is another way to look at paper – one in which manipulation of paper, not the paint on the paper, is the primary focus.  Origami is probably the most well-known form of paper art – renowned for its delicacy and the intricacies of each fold.  But lately, I’ve been seeing some incredible paper art – 3- Dimensional cities constructed entirely out of paper with tiny, precise windows, and trees and street lamps and people walking their dogs.  There’s something really exquisite about paper sculptures – they can seem so vulnerable even when shaped to represent something so rooted – like a city.  Even when layered and cut to geometric perfection (or as close as we can get to it), paper sculptures seem soft and frail.  In an interview with Co.Design, Spanish artist Elena Mir speaks of paper as a “beautiful material that has endless possibilities [and of the] grace and beauty with which light and shadows

slide across the surface.”  Mir’s Geometric Spaces series is formed from hundreds of pieces of paper cut with precision and stacked to form multi-dimensional patterns.  Paper is able to embody both strength and softness in a way that most materials struggle to accomplish on their own.