Layers of Growth
Year Completed: 2023
Medium / Materials: Cardboard
Dimensions: 6” x 7” x 10”
Status: In Personal Collection
Exhibition: Benilde St. Margaret’s Showcase, October 2023 – June 2025
The Project
When brainstorming ideas for this sculpture, a bonsai tree was one of the first ideas that came to mind. Bonsai trees are like little mini trees that are small enough to be houseplants. I love how much detail is in each bonsai tree and how unique they all are.
Design Process
After creating some sketches for my bonsai tree, I got to work, creating a small base for my sculpture. I jumped right into making the base of the tree by using a paper towel roll, tearing it apart, bending it into the perfect life-like tree trunk, and hot gluing it into form. I added geometric pieces of cardboard to create the branches from there. I was originally thinking about using crumbled cardboard for the leaves, but I decided on a more abstract design instead, using geometric layers to create the dome shapes. I also used this geometric layering technique on one part of the trunk to create more emphasis on the flow and movement that I wanted the trunk to show. Throughout the whole process, I kept all of my cardboard scraps and repurposed many of them to add more detail to my sculpture. I decided to leave the cardboard showing because of how interesting the texture is and to help display the layers and dimensions in the cardboard. I loved creating this sculpture and it really made me think outside of the box and consider new ways to utilize cardboard and layers to create 3D forms.
Materials
One thing that I think I did well was utilizing many different ways of showing dimension with cardboard. One thing that I think I could have done better would be to make the lowest branch stronger to support the weight of the leaves/dome better.