The Nocturnal Life of a Paper-folding Master

Publication Date：02/01/2004
Byline：JIM HWANG

At the witching hour, when the world is still and quiet, Lai Chen-hsiang, a master paper folder, begins to create objects of remarkable beauty. From the dead sheets of paper, he coaxes to life blossoming roses, teapots, and even human figures modeling on a catwalk.

Near the Taichung Train Station, along one of the city's older streets, lies the 70-year-old Ching Kuang Paint Shop. Its shelves hold a rainbow of colors, brushes hang on hooks, and nooks contain all manner of paint supplies. Near the entrance, however, housed in a glass viewing case, lives a world in miniature, as brilliant as the shades of paint.

In the stillness of the case, a dragon is frozen in time, flowers bloom eternally, and human sculptures stand still in angular poses. Without the small plate that reads "Chen Hsiang Paper Art Research," visitors would probably have a hard time figuring out that the "sculptures" are actually folded from pieces of papers.

The paper menagerie provides a glimpse into the other life of the 60-year-old paint store proprietor. "Selling paint is how I make my living, folding paper is how I live," says owner and paper-folding master Lai Chen-hsiang. Lai explains that the shop is a family business established by his father, but his enthusiasm for paper folding has nothing to do with family heritage. At the age of 12, Lai first discovered the miniature wonders of paper folding, when he picked up a bird crafted from a single sheet of folded paper on his way home from school. The young Lai spent three hours unfolding then folding it back, and he has not been able to take his mind off of paper folding since.

Lai's enthusiasm for paper folding, however, was not quite what his parents had in mind for their son. "Neither paper folding nor any other arts were considered a good way to make a living," Lai says. "Parents just don't want their children to waste time on them. I had to promise my father that I'd always give first priority to the family business, and only then was I allowed to make origami."

Lai kept that promise to his parents. He began working in the shop full-time after completing high school and his compulsory military service, and became the shop's owner after the retirement of his father more than 30 years ago. In addition to running the shop, Lai was also a subcontractor for painting projects. With the paint shop taking up so much of his waking hours, how then was Lai going to work on his art? The answer was easy; he would work at night.

When business for the day is done, and he has eaten and put all his affairs in order, Lai turns in for the evening, sleeping for about two hours between 10 o'clock and midnight. When he awakens from his short slumber, his time is devoted to his passion. To warm himself up, he makes a good pot of tea, lets the jazz roll out of his speakers, and sets to work until sunrise. He often catches up on his sleep during the day. This nocturnal life has resulted in tens of thousands of creations in miniature.

The origin of paper folding, according to Lai, is not documented, but it is generally accepted among scholars and artists that paper folding began approximately in the first century A.D. in China, where people whiled away the time folding paper into various shapes and forms. The art spread to Japan, where it found an honored place in the culture of the time. The Japanese integrated various paper-folding shapes and creations in their religious ceremonies, which still make use of origami figures today. Even the name commonly used for paper folding, "origami," sprung from two Japanese root words: ori, meaning "folding" and gami , which means "paper."

The Chinese, unfortunately, did not preserve and promote the art as the Japanese did. A handful of paper-folding artists have appeared, however, and some books have been published on the subject in Chinese in recent years. Because of the paucity of information on origami in Chinese, Lai, when he started folding paper, was left to his own wiles and a patience -testing process of trial and error. To accurately fold a piece of paper into desired shapes and angles, Lai even spent a lot of time researching math theories such as the Fibonacci sequence.

Groping his way through the intricate geometry of origami was, perhaps, not the most efficient way to learn the art, but it allowed Lai to develop unique techniques, not practiced by traditional origami artists. The Japanese, for example, use only square sheets of paper, but Lai experimented with different shapes of rectangular sheets, allowing him to get unusual effects. The shape of the paper is in fact one of the few variables in origami creation, since the origami artist never cuts or tears the paper, and must create his paper sculptures only by the variety and imaginativeness of his folds.

Today, Lai claims a total of 32 basic techniques in his paper-folding art, all of which are different ways to coax the paper into a desired shape. They include squeezing, pulling, pushing, twisting, and blowing, to name a few. Even without the use of scissors and rulers--the tools most of us would turn to if asked to make geometric objects out of a sheet of paper--Lai can produce myriads of perfectly sculpted shapes and angles. Lai likens the constituent parts of origami to the constituent parts of a Chinese character. Chinese characters are composed of parts known as radicals, which indicate meaning or pronunciation and appear in series of words, generally related. "Folding a sheet of paper into a desired shape requires the combination of different skills, just as writing a character requires the combination of several radicals," he explains. "Writing a character becomes easy if you can master the skills of writing radicals. It's the same theory at work in paper folding."

In addition to developing those skills, Lai has also spent a lot of time experimenting with different materials. He has tried almost every kind of paper he could get his hands on--thick, thin, hard, and soft. The size of a piece usually determines the thickness of the paper required, and the different "personalities" of the paper give the origami artist a variety of textures that can mimic the appearance of metal, wood, or other surfaces. In recent years, Lai has folded sheets of stainless steel wire mesh and combined paper with wire eyeglass frames to get some unusual effects. The materials, however, are always the simplest part, for the creation can only spring from the clever hands of an origami practitioner through the folding process.

As Lai sees it, the difficult part is designing a piece, which usually takes much longer than the actual folding. The Phoenix Boat, for example, took 18 months of designing and only four months of folding. Amazingly, all of the designs are done in Lai's head, without any drawings or blueprints.

The pieces Lai has created include everything from Chinese historical figures to galactic warriors, as well as more traditional origami subjects such as flowers and animals. His inspiration comes from all over the place, including TV cartoons, nature, and everyday life. Although he will work on certain themes, none of his origami creations is identical. "Innovation is the fun part," Lai says. "Repeating what I've folded before would kill the fun." He explains that a basic shape is like the trunk of a tree, and there can be numerous possibilities for the "branches" sprouting from the trunk.

Since his first solo exhibition in 1985, Lai's works have been exhibited in Taiwan as well as in some Asian, European, and American countries. None of his works is for sale, and none of them can be found in any paper-folding books. People who have seen his creations have encouraged him to publish a book about the art, but Lai does not think it is a workable idea. The reason is that most of his works are so complicated that a single piece may need a whole book to introduce it step-by-step. "People expect to get a book that shows them how to fold a few dozen things," he says. "One book for folding one thing only? I think it would end up on a shelf collecting dust."

Lai is, nevertheless, more than willing to share his skills. He has been teaching high school art classes and art teachers, and giving demonstrations at exhibitions and cultural festivals. Instead of teaching step-by-step folding, Lai prefers to share some basic folding techniques so that those who are interested can create their own pieces. "Paper folding is like a magic show where things become transparent once you know the secret," he says. "There isn't a fixed rule in paper folding, so once you are familiar with the basics you can create whatever you want."

Whether it is a class demonstration or a solo exhibition, "great" is one of the most common comments Lai's paper -folding art receives. The artist, however, would rather call his works "serious" than "great." "I'm a serious person, and I research and try, and research and try, and go on until it works," he says. "There's no secret to success but taking it seriously." So every midnight, Lai goes upstairs to his workshop, makes a pot of good tea, puts on his favorite jazz, and earnestly folds a new life in miniature.