Re: [Origami] Froebel - Seventh Gift - origami and ratios

[Matthew Gardiner]

On 4 Mar. 2017, at 1:11 am, Laura R  wrote:
> 
>> I came across something quite wonderful in my PhD research today.
>> 
>> I picked up a book on Frank Lloyd Wright, an American architect with a 
>> considerable global reputation, at the University library, therein I 
>> discovered that he was inspired for a series of window-frame designs, and I 
>> suspect for the use of proportion in his career, by the seventh gift of 
>> Froebel as his insight into proportion.
> 
> You should get the book Inventing Kindergarten by Norman Brosterman. There is 
> a whole chapter about the influence of kindergarten ideas (and behind that, 
> Froebel’s) on Frank Lloyd Wright, as well as other modern artists. Quoting 
> from its cover: “Using examples from the work of important artists who 
> attended kindergarten —including Georges Braque, Piet Mondrian, Paul Klee, 
> Wassily Kandinsky, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Le Corbusier, among others —he 
> demonstrates that the design ideas of kindergarten prefigured modern 
> conceptions for the aesthetic power of geometric abstraction.” Norman 
> Brosterman’s amazing collection of Froebelian crafts was part of a MoMa 
> exhibition, Century of the Child, in 2011: 
> http://www.brosterman.com/kindergarten.shtml. 
> But get the book, you’ll love it. 
> 
> Laura Rozenberg

Thanks so much Laura and Patsy for chiming in here, I’m going to get that book!

I happened to also borrow a book on the Bauhaus teaching methodology - 
following a research trail left by Erik Demaine on Curved Folding, and from the 
list of artist you mention Klee and, Kandinsky were teachers at the Bauhaus. 
Made me wonder if they are connected - being German - the time periods 
bookending… after a little more research, and I find the connection is already 
documented. 

"The Bauhaus ... including the way in which it was set up by Walter Gropius and 
Johannes Itten, its roots in the work of Friedrich Froebel” 
- Lerner, Fern. "Foundations for design education: continuing the Bauhaus 
Vorkurs vision." Studies in Art Education 46.3 (2005): 211-226.

Without reading Inventing Kindergarten, I can see the same visual and 
sculptural language in Froebel and Bauhaus. The visual and sculptural language 
- including origami - was being influenced by more than a casual connection of 
Froebelian methods, Froebel was in the roots of the course design. 

The transfer from Froebel origami to Bauhaus paper folding is a very 
interesting connection. 

This is a plausible reason as to why Albers was teaching paper folding in the 
preliminary course in the first place. Paper as a medium has an intrinsic 
property: it can be folded. Folding is geometry; is mathematics; is a 
structural language. 

This point in particular would be of interest to origami to know more about. 

Matthew Gardiner

Re: [Origami] Blintzed Bird Base

[Robert J. Lang]

Thus spake "Origami on behalf of Meenakshi Mukerji" 
 on 
3/4/17, 9:16 AM:

> From: Anna 
> Step 7 shows a blintzed bird base and even says so. No idea whether the
> base from step 10 has a name on its own. The numeration of the steps is
> very peculiar though.

>>>
[MM] Thanks for your reply, Anna.  Yes, step 7 says Blintzed Bird Base but I 
asked anyway because I have seen different definitions on the internet. …  
unambiguous numbers :) It would still be interesting to know who was the first 
one to come up with what is in Step 10.  The steps leading to it are very 
natural and there may be multiple people who arrived at it independently.  Any 
clues/pointers  would be appreciated!  These are the times when I miss David 
Lister...
<<<

Randlett names step 7 the Blintzed Bird Base in both The Art of Origami (1961, 
see page 145) and The Best of Origami (1963, see page 126). Step 10 is the 
basis of George Rhoads’s Bug, presented in Best Of Origami (it appears as step 
3 on page 130). That’s the earliest appearance I’ve seen of step 10 explicitly. 
Rhoads explored the Blintzed Bird Base extensively, so you see several 
different treatments of it in his 1950s/1960s work.

It should be noted that Yoshizawa explored multiply blintzed Frog Bases back in 
the 1950s (his 1959 Cicada is made from what amounts to two Blintzed Frog 
Bases), so there’s a good chance that he created the BBB and “step 10” as part 
of that exploration. Since he didn’t give instructions for his more complex 
creations, though, that must remain supposition.

Robert

Re: [Origami] Blintzed Bird Base

[Meenakshi Mukerji]

> From: Anna 
>
> https://68.media.tumblr.com/71cbe319eb2561931a24c175ae336d
27/tumblr_ndpoo3dsmZ1sl3qh0o5_1280.jpg
>
> Step 7 shows a blintzed bird base and even says so. No idea whether the
> base from step 10 has a name on its own. The numeration of the steps is
> very peculiar though.

Thanks for your reply, Anna.  Yes, step 7 says Blintzed Bird Base but I
asked anyway because I have seen different definitions on the internet. And
yes, the numbering is funky but fortunately my questions deal with
unambiguous numbers :)

It would still be interesting to know who was the first one to come up with
what is in Step 10.  The steps leading to it are very natural and there may
be multiple people who arrived at it independently.  Any clues/pointers
would be appreciated!  These are the times when I miss David Lister...

Meenakshi