Google doodle today celebrates 101st birthday of grandmaster of Origami Akira Yoshizawa. For years, children across the world used this paper folding technique to make objects like boats, aeroplanes etc till Yoshizawa developed the craft into a form of art. He turned a child's past time into a three-dimensional magic, diagram by diagram and model by model.
The doodle on Google's home page is adorned with ready-to-flutter butterflies popularised by Yoshizawa. Each letter of the Google's logo too has been given the appearance of a paper folding design just like in the Origami art form.
Yoshizawa was born on March 14, 1911 in Kaminokawa, Japan, into a family of dairy farmers. He moved to Tokyo when he was just 13 years old to take a job in a factory. During his days at the factory, he taught employees basic geometry where he used Origami as a teaching tool.
In 1937, Yoshizawa quit his factory job to practice origami full time basis. However, for the next two decades he lived in poverty making a living by selling fish door-to-door.
Yoshizawa got his big break in 1951, when a Japanese magazine asked him to create models of the 12 signs of the Japanese zodiac. The exposure catapulted him to international fame. His work has since been exhibited across the world and several books have been published on the art form.
Yoshizawa died in Tokyo in March 2005.
Google doodles are the decorative changes that are made to the Google logo to celebrate holidays, anniversaries, and the lives of famous artists and scientists. The first doodle was created by Larry Page and Sergy Brin in the year 1998 to mark the celebrations of the Burning Man Festival.
Google currently has over 1000 doodles. Google recently revamped its doodle site, which features largely all doodles created by the company. The website also gives a peek into the creative process that goes into creating these doodles.