For the edification of anyone else who’s trying this: I found it worked best to fold the top lip before folding the “spring”, which was the opposite of what I had originally expected. And I doubt I would have managed this without folding the 8-sided Compass Rose Jar first.

When all’s said and done, a remarkably nifty little jar. With the spring collapsed the right distance, it’s very reminiscent of a little clay pot.

That is so where I wasn’t going with that.

I was trying to mock the making of art hierarchy, not to draw attention to me as artiste. That other people can’t fold my stuff, that just means I’m still failing to explain myself adequately. I’m working on that.

It’s all art – from the hobo’s burgoo to the Parthenon. And it’s not that we can’t make aesthetic judgments about pieces of art or entire genres – get me going on opera or ballet, some time – it’s that governing bodies attempting to say a sculpture is more Art than a ceramic pot is an obscenity worth fighting. Or at least mocking broadly.

This all said, that shape is called a one-sheet hyperboloid. And it does have fun properties. It’s springy!

But anyway, do you know what the mathematical name for the shape of the top half is? I want to look it up, I bet it has all sorts of fun properties…