Folds and Fungi

Surface to Structure: An Origami Exhibition Featuring 80 Paper Artists at Cooper Union A huge exhibition of 80 contemporary origami artists featuring 120 paper creations is planned to take place this summer at Cooper Union in New York. Cooper Union was the site of the first origami exhibition in the United States 55 years ago. Titled Surface to Structure , the event is curated by Uyen Nguyen who is seeking funding on Indiegogo to help transport the numerous fragile artworks across the globe from 5 different continents.   Fantastic Fungi: The Startling Visual Diversity of Mushrooms Photographed by Steve Axford Photographer Steve Axford lives and works in the Northern Rivers area of New South Wales in Australia where he spends his time documenting the living world around him, often traveling to remote locations to seek out rare animals, plants, and even people. But it's his work tracking down some of the world's strangest and brilliantly diverse mushrooms and other fungi that has resulted in an audience of online followers who stalk his work on Flickr and SmugMug to see what he's captured next.     Calamityware: Disastrous Scenarios on Traditional Blue Porcelain Dinner Plates For centuries artisans have been crafting white porcelain dishes and decorating them with intricate cobalt blue patterns, from floral designs to swirling landscapes. Enter graphic designer Don Moyer who is turning the tradition on its head with his wildly successful line of Calamityware dinner plates. Moyer expertly mimics several Eastern motifs in his plates with one major addition: flying monkeys, a UFO assault, and giant gurgling sea monsters.   Dance Through an Abandoned Warehouse Filled with Hundreds of Swinging Pendulums World-renowned choreographer and artist William Forsythe has just unveiled his latest "choreographic object," an old municipal market space filled with hundreds of suspended pendulums that swing in timed sequences. As visitors move through the space they are forced to duck, dodge, and dart through the rows of swinging weights (technically plumbobs) resulting in an impromptu dance. Forsythe is known for his unique blend of choreography and artwork where the viewer often becomes a participant in his interactive installations.   Edible Crayon and Paint-Splattered Chocolate Bars by Unelefante Chocolate maker Unelefante makes some pretty beautiful chocolate bars including one that looks like melted crayons and another inspired by the drippy paint splashes of Jackson Pollock. You can read much more about them over on KNSTRCT.   OLED Dandelion Lights by Takao Inoue These beautiful lights were designed by cinematographer Takao Inoue as part of a small exhibition on display at Milano Salone earlier this year. The lights are made from real dandelions that have been suspended inside an acrylic block with a miniature OLED light embedded within the stem. The TAMPOPO OLED (tampopo is Japanese for dandelion) is now available through Tokyo Somewhere.   New in the Shop: "Nautilus" by Rafael Araujo We are thrilled to announce that the Colossal Shop now carries exclusive prints by Venezuelan artist Rafael Araujo. In the midst of our daily binge of emailing, Facebooking, Instagramming and Photoshopping, it's hard to imagine how anything was done without the help of a computer. For Araujo, it's a time he relishes. At a technology-free drafting table he deftly renders the motion and subtle mathematical brilliance of nature with a pencil, ruler and protractor. Araujo creates fictional fields of three dimensional space where butterflies take flight and the logarithmic spirals of shells swirl into existence.