BROWN PAPER

www.saadya.net

 

Guest Book

 

 

 

This is the guest book of the physical exhibition of "Brown Paper", preceded by post-exhibit reactions and comments emailed to me from around the world.

 

You are welcome to add your own reaction by emailing info@saadya.net.

 

 

 

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Post-Exhibit Reactions

 

 

 

 

 

From: Stanley Cavell, Emeritus Professor of Aesthetics, Harvard University

 

January 17, 2005

 

 

 

Dear Saadya,

 

Have I not written to you in response to the photos of your Brown Paper exhibit? ...I hurriedly simply say that I was startled by the strength and subtlety of your pieces. I was too ignorant to be able to imagine the experience of the work when you briefly described it. I also very much liked your accompanying program statement. Foolish as it is to try to react without seeing the pieces in the flesh, I have one minor thought to include on the YES side of whether origami is sculpture (or between sculpture and drawing?). Namely: there is a sense of magic about the sheer fact of the pieces that draws one to them to "see how they are done". "It's just paper" is like "It's just charcoal" .... And this doesn't fade. But it wouldn't matter if one weren't drawn by the emotion of the thing -- it's not merely that a trick is to be explained. Any trick here is inexplicable; there is no trick. Also there is the standing issue the work of these works pose as between (so to speak) sculpture and painting, namely of the relation of the work to its support. With sculpture the "support" is reduced to a base, and advanced sculptors have done away even with that. In Brown Paper what happens to the support is the work of the work, and the support has totally vanished while remaining totally in view. (Magic?)

 

 

 

I heartily congratulate you.

 

 

 

As always,

 

Stanley

 

 

 

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From: Roman Diaz [pioneer of origami animal design], Uruguy

 

30 May, 2005

 

 

 

Hi Saadya

 

I have mailed my friend and folder Daniel Naranjo from Colombia... Here is his comment when I told him I had met you: 

 

"Y llegamos a la depresi—on... Menos es mas dije antes, y el trabajo de Saadya me puso triste dos d’as... Este personaje pliega cosas que yo he so–ado mucho tiempo, y es tan simple, tan solo dos dobleces... Cuando v’ sus fotos me conmov’ como hace mucho no lo hac’a...." 

 

"... and here comes the depression...."less is more" I said before, and Saadya's work made me sad for two days... this guy folds things I have dreamt of for a long time, so simple, just two folds....When I saw his photos I was moved like I hadn't been in a long time ...."

 

 I feel quite the same about your work, without the depression part. 

 

--Roman

 

 

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Many thanks for the reference to your very impressive Web site. Having seen your portrait of Leonardo at the Masters of Origami Exhibition, I am very pleased, indeed to see more of your work.

 

Best wishes,

 

David Lister

[World¹s Leading historian of the Origami Arts]

 

 

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It is very kind to send the fascinating image.

I will follow up the website.

 

very best,

 

martin kemp

 

 

Professor of the History of Art

Oxford

 

[THE authority on Leonardo da Vinci]

 

 

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April 6, 2005

 

 

What a beautiful site!!!

 

Whoever designed it should get an astronomical bonus. Or, at the least, be immortalized by basing a piece on his half-handsome visage.

 

Sincerely,

 

Menachem Nerenberg

 

Passaic, NJ USA

 

 

 

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BROWN PAPER Exhibit Book

Translated from the Hebrew

 

07.12.04

 

Much light comes from this exhibit, a gentleness & strength. A great pleasure.

 

Dalia Morgenstern

 

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Saadya—they are outstanding!

 

Moving in their beauty and expressiveness and vitality.

 

With an embrace of "well done"

 

Ruth Nevo [Israel's top landscape painter]

 

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Saadya

 

This is good art & one that does the viewer good.

 

Also of course more than that: About where it comes from; --from the depths; from chaos brought to a compassionate order.

 

Ariela Shavit [painter and photographer]

 

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07.12.04

 

There are times, it's amazing

 

What people can create

 

Capture the moment

 

Capture a movement

 

And give the inert object a soul.

 

You Saadya---Have done it!

 

Eyal Nardi [Founder, Israel Paperfolders Society (Haifa)]

 

 

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To Saadya from Itai Sternberg.

 

The exhibit was very successful and what interested me was that

 

what you see from one point of view isn't like what you see from another.

 

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Dear Saadia

 

Your "origami" is splendid

 

This is creative art, while some origami is plagiarism.

 

Keep on with the good work

 

Happy Folding

 

Herman Mariano [Israel's foremost animal paperfolder]

 

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Very fine show, original, wonderful. Thanks

 

Yehuda Atlas, and Yuval and Ronit.

 

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For Saadya

 

Magical. Exceptional and special exhibit. Was worth coming!

 

Miri Golan

 

Director, Israeli Origami Center

 

December 2004

 

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08.12.04

 

For Saadya

 

Charming and interesting

 

Exceptional

 

Very beautiful

 

Yehudit

 

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8.12.04

 

Amazing and magnificent, I lack the words to express my surprise.

 

It seems there's no limit to creativity and imagination in people like yourself.

 

Thanks, Naomi Korenberg

 

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8.12.04

 

For Saadya!!!

 

I thought the works were from clay.

 

Hats off for the patience and creativity, well done.

 

Dorit Ashkenazi

 

Municipal Supervisor

 

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For Saadya

 

Wonderful, stunning. To look is to be amazed

 

A true talent. Gives me strength

 

Abubut 8.12.04

 

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For Saadya!!!

 

Great job. Very good, keep going this way and of course you can move forward too.

 

Israel, 8.12.04

 

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The exhibit—

 

Surprising & interesting & fascinating!

 

Dr. Zvi Karniel, 9.12.04

 

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9.12.04

 

A handsome, original exhibit, with a highly creative talent.