Oxford Summer school - 1000 cranes

I began my teaching course at Oxford summer school and we started by making origami cranes and hanging them in the class to draw tomorrow. This course is called Drawing words and writing pictures and drawing cranes offers the chance for great text and also the drawing of angles and spatial planes.

Sadako and The 1000 Cranes

Sadako Sasaki was twelve when she was diagnosed with leukemia as a result of the bombing of Hiroshima when she was two. A little friend told her that according to traditional folklore, if she could fold 1000 cranes – a Senbazuru - a wish would come true. She folded cranes using every bit of paper available and soon her ward was filled with origami cranes. She had folded more than 500 cranes when she died and her classmates completed the 1000 cranes which were buried with her.

In Hiroshima's Peace Park, there is a statue of Sadako holding a golden origami crane as a symbol of peace. Thousands of paper cranes from all around the world, are at the base of the statue and she is remembered on Peace Day on the 6th August every year.

I first heard Sadako's story when I saw it enacted as a string puppet show in Cape Town. The theatrical effect of hundreds of paper cranes was amazing.

While it may not seem relevant to start a drawing class with origami, I really believe that we need to inspire people on a visual and a spiritual level.

Postscript:  My Japanese students laughed at the elementary origami cranes we make - these are definitely primary school cranes and they make quite exotic complicated ones. Having taught origami today to people new to this art, I think its just as well that they are easy to make!

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