Fun with scissors: A little art hoax

Sometimes a hoax isn't all bad. There's an email circulating about a contest at Washington, DC's Hirshhorn Museum wherein artists were required to use nothing except a pair of scissors and a single piece of paper. The email includes images of some really impressive stuff .  (Impressive especially to someone like myself who can barely make a string of paper dolls. They always have these weird oblong heads.)

Great, except that it never happened. The works exist, but there was never a contest, the Hirshhorn was never involved, and all the pieces were done by a single artist, Peter Calleson. First clue is that the email misspelled the name of the Hirshhorn (gotta have all three of those h's); second is that the Hirshhorn's website bears no mention of any such contest. But I have to admit that I enjoyed the pieces regardless. Here are a few of my favorites.















The problem with this hoax is that it deprives a very talented person of credit for his work. I really don't know why someone would want to do this. But at any rate, my hat is off to Peter Calleson. I bet he can make paper dolls with round heads too.

Happy Friday. Have a nice weekend!