Something that began as a simple experiment, and a request by Bernie Kaminski‘s daughter, has now turned into a never-ending creative project in which making paper mâché pieces is part of Kaminski’s every day. Some years ago Kaminski’s daughter learned the art of paper mâché at school and then asked her father to make her a basketball – but no one, the least Kaminski himself, knew what kind of rabbit hole it would lead the artist down to.
Kaminki finds inspiration in everyday household objects around him, as he re-creates them into amusing, naturalistic three-dimensional paper mâché artworks
Simply giving it a go and finding the process fun and interesting, led Kaminski to keep on creating different kinds of everyday objects with paper mâché. Something about re-imagining ordinary things and objects in three-dimensional paper format intrigues the artist to create more and more. “I can’t really draw or paint but when I started making paper mâché pieces I thought they looked interesting enough to keep doing it”, Kaminski told It’s Nice That. Now, over five years since his first creation, Kaminski’s Instagram has hundreds of works, ranging from a bag of tennis balls, with each ball having a hand-painted logo on it, to a simple, neatly folded white t-shirt and a half-rolled-up measuring tape. From sloppy burgers to tasty pieces of cake, and a pair of raggedy tennis shoes to a full-blown Thanksgiving dinner, the objects Kamiski re-creates with paper mâché are simply those he sees around him. Or sometimes, something specific caught his eye, something he wants to figure out – like a button-down shirt – he learned to do by taking part one of his actual dress shirts.
But it’s the objects he chooses to re-create, the everyday items and useless things, that make his work so enjoyable – as traditionally we always find amusement and delight in art imitating life.
It seems that simple curiosity and the need for creativity are the driving forces behind Kamisky’s endless project. These primal forces that can be found inside all of us are strong enough in him, and together with that childhood nostalgia that playing with paper mâché has, make his story and works relatable and intriguing. But it’s the objects he chooses to re-create, the everyday items and useless things, that make his work so enjoyable – as traditionally we always find amusement and delight in art imitating life.
Follow Kaminski on Instagram to see all his paper mâché creations, and what he’ll do next.
Images © Bernie Kaminski