List of origamists

An origamist or an origamian is a person who is associated with the art of origami. Some notable origamists / origamians are:

A

 * Jay Ansill – composer and folk musician who also wrote The Origami Sourcebook

B

 * John Blackman – American artist who specializes in ikebana merged with origami
 * Didier Boursin – author of many books about origami
 * Kevin Box – artist who developed process in order to turn folded paper into metal sculptures using the lost wax technique, for the traveling exhibition Origami in the Garden which features 18 large-scale sculptures including a majestic tower of 1000 cranes, flying birds, painted ponies, emerging butterflies, floating boats, and more
 * Krystyna and Wojtek Burczyk – Polish origami artists who both studied mathematics and computer science

C

 * Brian Chan – former mechanical engineering student at MIT who now specializes in origami of insects, humans, and figures inspired by fantasy and the visual arts
 * Joel Cooper – American artist who specializes in tessellation

D

 * Martin Demaine and Erik Demaine – father-and-son team who manipulate flat paper into swirling forms. Erik is the leading theoretician in computational origami, the study of what can be done with a folded sheet of paper.
 * Roman Diaz – Uruguayan origamist who specializes in animals and has published two books
 * Giang Dinh – Vietnamese artist who studied architecture and uses primarily white paper

E

 * Christine Edison – American artist who specializes in tessellations
 * Peter Engel – author of several origami books including Origami from Angelfish to Zen, 10-Fold Origami: Fabulous Paperfolds You Can Make in Just 10 Steps!, and Origami Odyssey (born 1959)

F

 * Vincent Floderer – French artist who specializes in crumpling, creating organic forms such as mushrooms and toadstools and multi-layered forms such as corals and sponges
 * Tomoko Fuse (布施 知子) – famous for boxes and unit origami, as well as kusudama (balls made by sewing or gluing together separate, usually flower-shaped, units), paper toys, and masks. She has published over 60 books. She first learned origami while in the hospital as a child.(born 1951)

G

 * Eric Gjerde – Norwegian American artist who specializes in tessellations
 * Miri Golan – Israeli artist who uses origami to unite people of different religious and cultural backgrounds, and is married to the English origami artist Paul Jackson
 * Faye Goldman – artist who creates geometric designs, using ribbon to create polyhedra, “eggs,” and a series of donut shapes known as tori
 * Herman van Goubergen – Belgian computer programmer who specializes in trompe l’oeil work
 * Alice Gray – co-founder of the non-profit Friends of the Origami Center in New York (1914-1994)

H

 * Ichiro Hagiwara – engineer who has a printer prototype that potentially holds the key to the mass production of origami-engineered structures (at Meiji University). He also designed foldable plastic drinking bottles.
 * Jun Hamamoto – scientific engineer at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who holds origami workshops in San Quentin State Prison
 * Robert Harbin – popularised origami in Britain; also presented a series of short programmes entitled Origami, made by Thames Television for ITV (1908-1978)
 * Alma Haser – photographer who uses folded-paper imagery in her work
 * Jacob Hashimoto – created a large-scale paper mobile at Mary Boone Gallery (born 1973)
 * Koshiro Hatori – Japanese translator and origami artist whose research has led to breakthroughs in the mathematics of origami as well as the history of this art form both in Japan and the West
 * David A. Huffman – American electrical engineer who was a pioneer in developing the mathematics of origami, including 3D polyhedral and curved forms (1925-1999)
 * Tom Hull – American professor of mathematics at Western New England University who is known as a preeminent authority on the mathematics of paper folding
 * Humiaki Huzita – formulated the first six of the Huzita–Hatori axioms (1924-2005)

I

 * Roy Iwaki – Japanese American artist who created origami masks

J

 * Paul Jackson – English curator and origami artist who teaches in Israel and is married to origami artist and teacher Miri Golan
 * Beth Johnson – American designer known for her application of geometric motifs onto animals and other figures
 * Eric Joisel – French wet-folder renowned for his lifelike masks, including those of fellow origami enthusiasts (1956-2010)

K

 * Dhairya Kantawala – one of the youngest origamist, specialist in tessilation(born 2005)
 * Satoshi Kamiya – one of the youngest geniuses of the origami field (born 1981)
 * Kunihiko Kasahara – devised a standardized method for creating many modular polyhedra (born 1941)
 * Miyuki Kawamura – board member of the Japan Origami Academic Society and author of Polyhedron Origami for Beginners
 * Talo Kawasaki – co-designer of the American Natural History Museum’s annual origami holiday tree
 * Toshikazu Kawasaki – Japanese mathematician famous for his Iso-area folding theory and his many geometric folds, including Kawasaki's "Rose" (born 1955)
 * Marc Kirschenbaum – known for his instrumentalist designs (born 1969)
 * Hideo Komatsu – Japanese artist who specializes in elegantly stylized animal forms
 * Goran Konjevod – Croatian mathematician and computer scientist who relies on natural tension found in the paper
 * Daniel Kwan – Chinese American artist who developed a specialty of using edge-based modules to weave together various polyhedra compounds

L

 * Michael G. LaFosse – an American biologist who uses wet-folding technique and his own specially made papers to create dynamic representations of the natural world
 * Robert J. Lang – author of many Origami books including the new benchmark Origami Design Secrets; formerly a laser physicist at NASA before quitting in 2001 and committing to origami full-time
 * David Lister – founding member of the British Origami Society
 * Byriah Loper – artist who creates original origami designs and patterns, most of which are formed from interlocking geometric shapes
 * Ekaterina Lukasheva – Russian artist based in the US who specialises in geometric origami, including modular origami, and tessellations with curves and spirals. Author of 4 modular origami books.

M

 * Sipho Mabona – Swiss and South African origami master who created a life-size elephant from a single piece of paper. He also designed origami for the award-winning Asics corporate movie Origami in the Pursuit of Perfection, which was featured at the Japanese American National Museum.
 * Jun Maekawa – software engineer, mathematician, and origami artist known for popularizing the method of utilizing crease patterns in designing origami models
 * Matthew T. Mason – American roboticist who developed the first origami folding robot, demonstrating advances in difficult manipulation tasks
 * Mademoiselle Maurice – French street artist who uses simple origami shapes in large quantities for unique public installations
 * Linda Tomoko Mihara – Japanese artist best known for her work with folded cranes, in particular her three-dimensional origami sculptures
 * Ligia Montoya – Argentine paper-folder who played a crucial role in establishing paper-folding as an international movement
 * John Montroll – probably the most prolific Western artist and author of over 40 books on origami
 * Jeannine Mosley – best known for her origami models created from business cards, including the Menger Sponge. She is also a graduate of MIT with a Ph.D. in electrical engineering and computer science. She has developed mathematical techniques for designing and analyzing curved origami models.
 * Jun Mitani – Japanese computer scientist who creates works with 3D modeling and designed the ORI-REVO software
 * Paulo Mulatinho – Brazilian designer who is the founding president of Origami Germany

N

 * Jo Nakashima – artist who creates origami kinetic sculptures
 * Jared Needle – artist who specializes in the world of fantasy and the supernatural, in particular the characters featured in anime and video games
 * Uyen Nguyen – engineer-turned-artist who uses fashion design to explore mathematical concepts like the Fibonacci sequence, various symmetries, and flat-foldability

O

 * Lillian Rose Vorhaus Kruskal Oppenheimer – American origami pioneer whose birthday (November 11) is International Origami Day

P

 * Chris K. Palmer – artist whose folding projects specialize in tessellations—created when a shape is repeated across a plane without any gaps or overlaps—as well as “polypouches” and twists
 * Benjamin Parker – artist who uses geometric origami to design tessellations and corrugations
 * Bernie Peyton – American origami artist who specializes in sculptural works of wildlife, and teaches origami to patients at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland

Q

 * Hoang Tien Quyet – Vietnamese artist who focuses on sculpted animals

R

 * Samuel Randlett – helped design and popularize the Yoshizawa-Randlett diagramming system
 * Steve Robbins – artist who makes origami out of paper currency, and was the subject of a 2019 exhibition at the Kansas City Fed's Money Museum
 * Nick Robinson – professional origami artist and author of over seventy books on origami
 * James Roper – artist who folded 10,000 origami flowers
 * Leonor Rosser – origami presenter for television
 * Andrea Russo – Italian artist who specializes in tessellations with geometric patterns and abstract sculptures using straight lines or curves

S

 * Victoria Serova – Russian artist who specializes in complex origami forms such as multi-legged insects and crustaceans
 * Jeremy Shafer – professional entertainer and origamist based in Berkeley, California
 * Matt Shlian – paper engineer and artist whose paper folding helps top scientists visualize cellular division and solar cell development
 * Heinz Strobl – German artist known for his development of two types of modular origami using strips of paper
 * Richard Sweeney – British artist who manipulates paper by hand to create 3-D design models, many of which ultimately developed into sculptures
 * Jacqui Symons – artist whose work focuses on the influence of multiples and repetition, creating immersive installations
 * Ross Symons – artist who specializes in miniature animals

T

 * Te Jui Fuo – artist starring in 2009 documentary "Folding Largest Origami Dragon in the World"
 * Florence Temko – pioneer in spreading origami in the United States
 * Nicolas Terry – French psychotherapist with a background in engineering and molecular chemistry who designs his own animal forms
 * Norio Torimoto
 * Hieu Tran Trung – Vietnamese chemistry teacher who specializes in constructing complex skeletons of various types of dinosaurs from multiple sheets of paper
 * Arnold Tubis – American physicist who published seven articles on the use of origami in mathematics education

U

 * Kōshō Uchiyama – Sōtō priest, origami master, and abbot of Antai-ji near Kyoto, Japan, and author of more than twenty books on Zen Buddhism and origami
 * Miguel de Unamuno – Spanish essayist, novelist, poet, playwright and philosopher who devised many new models and popularized origami in Spain and South America.

V

 * Polly Verity – British artist whose paper sculptures explore patterns and shadows and are complex and varied, from organic crumple forms to elaborate tessellations, often including curved folds

W

 * Russell Wood – author of Origami Made Simple
 * Jiangmei Wu – Indiana University Interior Design assistant professor and origami artist whose large-scale, origami-inspired artworks are tangible results of her research into the intersections between engineering, mathematics, technology and the arts

Y

 * Makoto Yamaguchi – Chairperson of Origami House
 * Akira Yoshizawa – reinvented modern origami and created the modern repertoire of folding symbols