Paper Craft and Pencil Sculpture

I'm a big fan of the creation of art with paper. It reminds me of hazy grade school days, cutting construction paper with the big plastic scissors, sniffing the glue sticks, sneaking into the library and being banned from creating a working volcano.

That's right, Sugar Creek E, don't think I've forgotten.

What I'm trying to say is that I -- like most everyone else, I would suspect -- knows how easy it is to create something with scissors and glue that will secretly disappoint your parents even as they hang it on the fridge. And that's why I'm secretly in love with Jen Stark right now.

Look at these pieces:





That there is crazy stuff. It's the sort of thing where I see it, and then think to myself: "Pah. All I'd need is some super glue and a knife." Because that's my solution to everything.

And all it would result in would be a sticky, poorly-cut mess that Sally would have trouble meeting my eye over as she leaned it against the fridge.

Then there's Jennifer Maestre. Her work bumfuzzles me. I want to love it so, but I'm vaguely disturbed by it.

Witness:





Neat, right? But not beautiful. It's almost willfully at odds with the viewer. And then you factor in the time it had to have taken to construct these and you've got to wonder at what the artist's intention was/is.

Or, maybe, like always, I'm just overthinking an interesting idea realized; the creation its own intention, Maestre's intention: creation. And these are the times when I realize that maybe I do miss my lit theory classes. Or, at least, the arguments that came with.