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Karakuri Report #21

October 10th, 2006

*"Karakuri Corner" opens at Indiana University!
　

This August, a puzzle exhibition opened in one of Indiana University's rooms. About 400 puzzles from around the world are exhibited there. In that, "Karakuri Corner" opens.
In that, Karakuri works of Hakone and Odawara districts, such as Japanese Wooden Interlocking Puzzles (JWIP), are one genre displayed. Since we started the Karakuri Creation Group, one of our goals has been to create new and exciting works. One of the foundations of our creations has also been the historical works seen in the Hakone and Odawara areas. Works made in this region have attracted world attention. This gives us even more motivation to further develop the Karakuri works!

The exhibition is held in the Lilly Library Slocum Puzzle Room at Indiana University, USA. Jerry Slocum, for whom the room was named, has announced his intention to donate his prized collection of more than 30,000 puzzles and nearly 4,000 puzzle-related books to the Lilly Library. The 400 works in the exhibition room were selected out of the 30,000 piece collection. These photos are the appearance of the library and the inside of the the exhibition room.

the Lilly Library

the Slocum Puzzle Room

*The New York Times carried Karakuri

The NYT wrote an article featuring "Cassiopeia", which was made by our Akio Kamei. The article introduced the closed structure details with an illustration. And they used the words Karakuri in describing it.
　

*Introduction Of Works Other Than The Karakuri Creation Group's Products
　

Until now, creating our own original works has been the most important purpose that we have advocated since the start of our group. We have created more than one hundred new creations since our first meeting seven years ago. We have also held many exhibitions and sales via the internet.

Additionally, we have entered our works in competitions and have achieved great success. Recall, the prize won this year at the international puzzle competition, the Nob Yoshigahara Puzzle Design Competition. We have achieved much more than we ever expected. Many of our successful products for this seven years were, Cassiopeia, Quartet, the Dream of Zebra, Walk of Ladybug, Monkey's Palanquin, The Box with a Key, Kuru Kuru Heart, W-O, A Chance Meeting and Box with a tree. We will also continue to create more and exciting Karakuri works.

However, we have felt that there are many works made by other craftsmen, which most people do not know about, in spite of their interesting ideas. So, we will introduce such works to you in future newsletters. If our Karakuri Creation Group can assist in working together to develop works, or aid in production and or sales, we will lend what ever support we can to help. We predict that the knowledge of Karakuri will spread further by this means. If any of our readers know of any exceptional works that they would like to introduce, by all means let us know.

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