To bend over or double up so that one part lies on another part, the act or instance of folding, to make compact by doubling, to become folded, crease, pleat, tuck, crinkle, fold
Day Four: Seeing through Art took place in a spacious community venue in Mansfield, where participants were guided through a series of origami processes by ‘papercraft’ artist, Katie Stainer. The focus of her work is to recreate detailed pieces for interiors and body adornments from books; the element of recycling to create individual pieces of art is key to her work. The Mansfield art group are extremely talented and took to the folding processes very quickly and again suprised volunteers with their detailed and ambitious ideas.
Participants were able to relate their ideas to those of Francis Upritchard’s exhibition at Nottingham Contemporary of figures wearing cloaks, scarves and hand-made garments. They made initial drawings onto two-dimensional mannequins supported by the team of volunteers and Katie discussed ideas and materials feasibility. No sooner had the folding begun, the group wanted further ways of folding; as one person told me:
I really love this way of working directly with my hands, I’ve become very adaptable over time with my eye condition
Katie was kept extremely busy, developing more unusual ways to support people’s ideas to create three-dimensional structures that dress a human figure. She produced an interesting range of maps, old sheet music, ribbons and folding dexterity. The main development of structured costume came after a lunch break, when the newly refreshed group began to mass produce beautiful folded paperbacks to make a body cloak, a waist band with contrasting shapes and a flared skirt sewn with ribbon. The group worked collaboratively like a group of fashion designers to pin, comment, change and re-arrange their folded shapes onto their full size mannequins. A boss, director and designer were also elected within the group; it was such an enjoyable day with plenty of laughter!
At the close of the day, the group presented each costume creation to the others, detailing the ideas and construction behind each, with a well deserved round of applause for everyone. Many thanks to the hard-working volunteers today, coming from Nottingham and Sheffield. Your support is very much appreciated.
The whole group working together to fold intricate paper designs
The group concentrate on origami folding recycled books
Janet creating a paper dress from folded maps
Katie helping Florence attach a folded book to her costume design
Margaret attaching paper diamond shapes to the mannequin
The Mansfield NRSB art group working as a team
Florence is supported by her volunteer in creating a complex costume
Janet stands to present her costume to the group
Margaret and Joyce discuss their final work of art
Paper folded costume influenced by Francis Upritchard’s exhibition
seeing through art 