Miniature origami gets a new identity

Oorjitha Dogiparthi was always fascinated and intrigued by the art of origami. Right from her childhood, she started making cute things with papers that were lying around her house. Now, she is one of the city’s most popular miniature artists. The 22-year-old girl is winning hearts across social media because her works stand out from the rest of the miniature artists. Unlike others, who create miniatures using polymer clay, Oorjitha uses only paper and she has the best reason for it — it’s easily available and paper craft is one of the best ways to recycle the product!

The self-taught artist says, “The love for paper led me to experiment with all forms of paper-based craft right from my childhood. When I reached college, I heard about miniature art and started learning more about it. I started experimenting with newspaper and magazine papers,” she says.

Oorjitha, who completed her post-graduation in Food Chemistry and Food Processing from Loyola College, started off by making food miniatures. “My course influenced me a lot and I started with food miniatures. One of the tough works was making noodles with paper! And I enjoyed creating a mini pressure cooker -it was my mother’s suggestion and she loved the final product,” smiles Oorjitha.

You couldn’t help but wonder how one can make cute little things with just paper and glue by incorporating crafts forms like origami and quilling. She smiles and says, “It’ isn’t really easy, but it is worth it. I am extremely passionate about it and am not going to stop doing it anytime soon. There are days when I develop continuous pain in my hands. During that time, I take two or three days because I’ve to focus on my studies as well. Miniatures push one’s imagination and I consider making them a challenge.”

On a break from her studies, the artist plans to learn easy techniques and use  of various grades of paper. “As of now, I use newspaper, tissue paper, magazine paper, pamphlet sheets, colour paper and normal A 4 white paper. I wanted to explore new craft methods and am spending time researching about it,” the youngster says.

Her miniatures are mainly inspired by pop culture, TV shows (Friends and Game of Thrones), movies (Harry Potter) series and daily objects.