The Art of Mask-making

My daughter has had to make a mask as a piece of Art homework over the last couple of weeks. She does enjoy Art and has put a lot of effort into this.

To start with I suggested she use a flat cardboard mask with an elastic strap - the kind you can buy for kiddies parties - as a base as we have a couple left over.

But no - to her credit, she wanted to make a shaped mask - the perfect fit for her face. I could only think of one way to do that - papier mache!

So here she is at the start - we covered the eye and nose area with clingfilm and I started layering on strips of newspaper coated with pva craft glue.

Once we had a few layers she sat there patiently waiting for it to dry a little - plugged in to her mp3 player to pass the time! 

Once it held it's shape, we transferred it to my polystyrene head form to dry properly. 

She added a few more layers over several days, ending in a white paper layer.

She's spent the weekend finishing this off with paint, sequins, feathers, etc. She's used a garden seedling stake for the holder which she's wrapped in ribbons. 

Excellent effort I reckon!

If that's put you in the mood to buy one for any forthcoming parties, Grin, Grimace and Squeak! make some amazing masks such as this one available to buy on Etsy.