Kailua Village Artists Gallery will feature Origami Designer and Sculptor
Shannon Nakaya throughout the month of March.
Nakaya started folding around 2011 when she discovered extreme
origami, very complex structures with 200-300 steps, creating complex,
expressive objects. A couple of years later, driven by her desire to make an
origami version of her beloved corgi, but not finding a pattern to follow, sent her
ricocheting off in a completely new direction: designing origami patterns. She
says designing opened up a completely different pathways in her brain. Up until
this point, her folding practice was mostly about following directions created by
others. Folding using a pattern is about precisely following directions written by
someone else, follow the path, and end up with the form intended. Not much
thinking or creativity involved. But designing, designing was about engineering,
creative thinking, and figuring it out. Why use this fold? Is it structural? What
does it do for the form? Will doing it a different way bear a better result?
Designing wasn’t about being obedient to a set of directions, but about creative
problem solving. This was about leading, tearing off in a new direction, not about
following a set of prescribed steps. This was not about blind obedience, this was
about creation, engineering, and math! A totally new path, personally and
artistically. Now she could spend her time creating exactly what she wanted and
not following directions from someone else!
Nakaya works only in creatures, with a preference for the fantastical and
whimsical. She wants her creatures to tell a story, to move, to express their
personality. But it is also important to her that creatures are anatomically correct,
that they look like what they represent. These days, she applies her origami dog
skills to commissioned pieces of beloved animal companions.
Shannon Nakaya will be working at the gallery on Fridays, March 10, 17,
and 24, 2023. The Kailua Village Artists Gallery is located in the Kona
Marketplace, 75-5729 Alii Drive, Suite C-110 in Kailua-Kona. The gallery is open
daily from 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. For more information please call 808-329-6653, or visit our
website at kailuavillageartists.com , and on FaceBook and Instagram: Kailua
Village Artists.