Cristian Marianciuc

Paper sculptor

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A crane a day

Cristian started his craft by folding the pages of his diary
He has built a vast community of origami lovers on Instagram
His creations are small in scale but very intricate

“Every crane tells a story.” And this is the story of Cristian Marianciuc, a young paper artist from Romania who taught himself the art of origami and started to build paper cranes as a form of therapy during a period of personal struggle. “The starting point is always a traditional origami crane, then I add decorations,” he says. “I spend fifteen hours on one single piece, and I've made around 5,000 of them. It’s a sort of visual diary for myself. The repetitive nature of what I do is therapeutic.” With a professional background in diplomacy, linguistics and foreign languages, he describes himself as a self-taught artist.

Interview

When did you start to fold paper?
Back in 2014, I developed the habit of folding pages of my personal diary and either keeping them for myself or gifting them to loved ones. At the beginning of 2015, the first stage of my project started.
Why did you choose this medium?
The origami crane has a particularly meaningful symbolism since it’s linked to the story of Sadako Sasaki and her struggle with leukaemia after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. One of my sisters also succumbed to leukaemia, so it was a very personal choice for me.
How did it become a profession?
The plan was to make an origami crane every single day for 100 days. It was a visual diary of sorts, intimate yet public. I created an Instagram account and shared the decorated cranes there. The 100 days became 365 and eventually I decided to keep creating my cranes for 1,000 consecutive days.
Where do you draw inspiration from?
Nature. In particular birds’ anatomy, flowers, mythology, and more recently perfume. Romanian folklore is another recurring theme in my work. I also enjoy creating hybrid folkloric motifs by combining Romanian and Japanese traditional art.

Cristian Marianciuc is an expert artisan: he began his career in 2015