11 Extraordinary Origami Artworks

No other art form involves mathematics as intrinsically as origami. Nor is any other community of art quite as dependent on the contributions of its members. Every new folding or design technique brings a slew of possibilities. "The process of designing origami figures is cumulative—one uses new techniques, refines old ideas, and one really can’t say that a particular figure is finished until it’s actually folded," says artist Robert J. Lang. Below, see 11 finished products, all of which represent a beautiful blending of talent, technique and science.



"Cocker"


French artist Eric Joisel designed and folded this dog in 2002 from a rectangular sheet of Canson fine art paper using the "wet-folded" technique invented by Japanese origami master Akira Yoshizawa.



"Goldfish"


In 2004, Joisel created this burnt-orange goldfish using a square-shaped blend of washi—a type of paper made in Japan from natural tree bark fibers—and sandwich foil.




"Dwarf N°3"


In 2004, Joisel created this dwarf violinist—demonstrating his fascination with J.R.R. Tolkien's work—from a blend of sandwich paper and foil.





"Ent"


Joisel recreated this fictional character based on the race of trees with humanlike qualities from The Lord of the Rings in 2004 from a blend of sandwich paper and foil.



"Stag Beetle BP" (Opus 477)


Known as one of the pioneers of the cross-disciplinary marriage of origami and mathematics, artist Robert J. Lang composed and folded this 5" arthropod using one uncut square of Origamido paper.




"Elephant" (Opus 111)


Lang created this sculpture, which is featured in his book The Complete Book of Origami, using one uncut square of kami paper.



"Allosaurus Skeleton" (Opus 326)


Lang created this 24" model—which, according to his website, was inspired by the late Issei Yoshino's Tyrannosaurus Rex—using 16 uncut squares of Wyndstone Marble (a.k.a. Elephant Hide) paper.




"3D Teapot"


Japanese artist Tomohiro Tachi folded this work, which was featured in the Siggraph 2007 Teapot Exhibit, using one piece of square paper, modeled after the Utah (or Newell) teapot, a mathematical model of an ordinary teapot.



"Leaf of Kajinoki"


Tachi designed this rendition of a mulberry leaf using Origamizer—a 3D origami design software that generates a crease pattern that folds into a given polyhedron, which Tachi developed himself.


"Camel"


Origami artist John Montroll—who invented the Dog Base and Insect Base folding techniques—developed this camel design in the 1980s, which was folded by German artist Sebastian Kirsch from a 30 cm square of foil-backed mulberry paper.




“Handshake”


This work was commissioned by the Aberdeen Asset Management Annual Report, for which artist Nick Robinson composed and folded several designs using newspaper in 2000. Each hand was created using one sheet of paper.