Doomscrolling
Please check out the video about the piece on YouTube. You can find the link to the right or below.
-------------------------------------------------
It is rare that an idea forms so clearly, and the execution of the idea closely matches the idea - well, it is in my experience.
I am a dedicated and experienced paper folder, determined to create a folded work that was an abstract linear representation of a common human experience - my chosen subject was the first year of the Covid-19 Pandemic.
The first year of the pandemic was personally really scary. As a near-retirement-aged teacher, teaching in a crowded inner-city high school, the anxiety of not feeling safe in the workplace was palpable. While health organizations were looking at infection methods, treatment methods, and vaccine development, I was one of the many ruled an “essential” worker, required to go to work. There was very little “work from home” - most of my work was required to be on site at school - even when the students were at home.
The idea behind the Doomscroll, otherwise known as “The Pandemicon,” was to represent the chronology of events starting in early 2020 - from the first infection, outbreaks, deaths, mutations, and the development of the first vaccines.
My work is based on a large-scale triangle twist tessellation. From the triangle twists (representing life BEFORE Covid), the regularity begins to disintegrate as we are introduced to the “Virion” - the infectious part of the virus. I designed this tessellated “virion molecule” to represent the “spiky sphere” we kept seeing in news visualizations. It is a result of transforming six adjacent triangle twists. An effect of nesting these “virion molecules” was that their connective flaps formed “Biohazard” symbols - a happy design accident. You can see these most clearly isolated on the end caps of the scroll spool.
Exploring the scroll further, you will see a few versions (mutations) of the virion molecule across the timeline of the scroll - mutations continue to proliferate, and this complicates the long-term vaccine strategies still being used to manage this virus. Black sunken hexagons represent deaths attributed to the virus - sadly these continue, due to side infections and other physiological vulnerabilities.
You can see evidence of the inexact science of “contact tracing” - the golden lines showing complex inter-relationships and convoluted infection paths. People need people, and the virus spread because of this. The golden lines are nods to the Japanese technique of mending broken pottery with gold threads - Kintsugi - representing the community's attempts to fix broken social structures, gatherings, the token wearing of masks, and washing hands.
The triangle twist field degenerates into a form of tessellated chaos, indicating fundamental shifts in society in the light of ongoing infections.
There is light in this darkness - the golden hexagon represents the first vaccines that were developed. Pfizer-BioNTech and the Moderna COVID-19 vaccines emerged relatively quickly because Covid was a strain of SARS, and SARS was already a problem worldwide.
Folded from a single un-cut 2.5 x 0.7 m rectangle of red/natural Kraft paper, I planned the grid, folded the piece over a period of a few weeks. I love that I can use Origami to express an idea, albeit in an abstract geometric way. I really enjoyed the creation process, and the intense problem-solving necessary to plan and create the piece. I hope you enjoy exploring it.
-------------------------------------------------
It is rare that an idea forms so clearly, and the execution of the idea closely matches the idea - well, it is in my experience.
I am a dedicated and experienced paper folder, determined to create a folded work that was an abstract linear representation of a common human experience - my chosen subject was the first year of the Covid-19 Pandemic.
The first year of the pandemic was personally really scary. As a near-retirement-aged teacher, teaching in a crowded inner-city high school, the anxiety of not feeling safe in the workplace was palpable. While health organizations were looking at infection methods, treatment methods, and vaccine development, I was one of the many ruled an “essential” worker, required to go to work. There was very little “work from home” - most of my work was required to be on site at school - even when the students were at home.
The idea behind the Doomscroll, otherwise known as “The Pandemicon,” was to represent the chronology of events starting in early 2020 - from the first infection, outbreaks, deaths, mutations, and the development of the first vaccines.
My work is based on a large-scale triangle twist tessellation. From the triangle twists (representing life BEFORE Covid), the regularity begins to disintegrate as we are introduced to the “Virion” - the infectious part of the virus. I designed this tessellated “virion molecule” to represent the “spiky sphere” we kept seeing in news visualizations. It is a result of transforming six adjacent triangle twists. An effect of nesting these “virion molecules” was that their connective flaps formed “Biohazard” symbols - a happy design accident. You can see these most clearly isolated on the end caps of the scroll spool.
Exploring the scroll further, you will see a few versions (mutations) of the virion molecule across the timeline of the scroll - mutations continue to proliferate, and this complicates the long-term vaccine strategies still being used to manage this virus. Black sunken hexagons represent deaths attributed to the virus - sadly these continue, due to side infections and other physiological vulnerabilities.
You can see evidence of the inexact science of “contact tracing” - the golden lines showing complex inter-relationships and convoluted infection paths. People need people, and the virus spread because of this. The golden lines are nods to the Japanese technique of mending broken pottery with gold threads - Kintsugi - representing the community's attempts to fix broken social structures, gatherings, the token wearing of masks, and washing hands.
The triangle twist field degenerates into a form of tessellated chaos, indicating fundamental shifts in society in the light of ongoing infections.
There is light in this darkness - the golden hexagon represents the first vaccines that were developed. Pfizer-BioNTech and the Moderna COVID-19 vaccines emerged relatively quickly because Covid was a strain of SARS, and SARS was already a problem worldwide.
Folded from a single un-cut 2.5 x 0.7 m rectangle of red/natural Kraft paper, I planned the grid, folded the piece over a period of a few weeks. I love that I can use Origami to express an idea, albeit in an abstract geometric way. I really enjoyed the creation process, and the intense problem-solving necessary to plan and create the piece. I hope you enjoy exploring it.
Creator:
Category:
Abstract
Type:
Artistic
Creation Date: