> On May 13, 2024, at 11:44 AM, Sam Levi via Origami > <origami@lists.digitalorigami.com> wrote: > > The fact that a posting has to be prefaced with a disclaimer should have been > a red flag that the contents would be controversial and upsetting to other > listers. While it may be true that art can sometimes be political it should > also be true that political art should have no place on this list…
I would respectfully differ on the “has no place” assessment, and cite as an example something that, with the passage of time, is probably no longer pushing people’s buttons (at least, not so hard now as they did then). Some time back, there were a couple of examples of people creating the logo for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, which was an “H” with an arrow in it (here’s a crease pattern for mine: https://langorigami.com/crease-pattern/hillary/ <https://langorigami.com/crease-pattern/hillary/>, sorry, no photo). That was definitely a political subject, but from an origami art point of view, it was an interesting challenge. (My recollection is that Meenakshi started it, Jason Ku did it from a smaller grid than either of us and also created a logo for H's opponent at that time, who was also a somewhat controversial figure.) Quite a few people then came up with further versions—variations, improvements, and just generally interesting origami. There were no complaints about the political nature at that time despite peoples’ emotions running high about the election. I think it’s possible to consider and discuss the art and origami aspects of a political artwork on this list without going down the digressive path of arguing the merits of the politics that inspired it, and I thought Joseph’s disclaimer did a pretty good job of making that distinction. Robert
