The last time we posted about Sipho Mabona, we boldly called his work, “the most beautiful origami art” we had ever seen. Though the Switzerland-based artist is known for his animal or nature pieces, he’s starting to show more conceptual ones including this installation which was recently displayed at the African Literature Festival in Lucerne, Switzerland. “I’ve dealt with the theme of floating away in some of my previous pieces like the koi and the swallows,” he says. “I love the thought of moving freely.”
“The basic idea was to have the balloons be a metaphor for hopes and dreams or thoughts of similar nature that let you escape from your everyday life,” he tells us. “Often escapism is looked at as something negative, yet it is exactly this floating away that helps you look at things in new ways, that gives you a kind of meta perspective.
“The different colors signify the different personalities and dramas, and their poses show how their reactions differ as they follow their dreams.
Sipho Mabona’s website
Photo credit: Chrisoffer Joergensen