Studio 1 Mask Making Process Post

In this project, we design and make masks for our partner according to their personalities. My partner is Hermione.

The information about her that I want to use in the project are: she wants to be famous and be the focus so that she can express her interesting ideas to people. However, at the same time, the ability that Hermione wants is to be invisible, so that she could observe people and do whatever she wants to do in the public. I think these two pieces of information are interesting because they are kind of contradictory. And I started with mindmap to design the mask.

The mindmap

After deciding use patterns from tribes on the mask, I started to research and below are the resource pictures that I like and interested in. The last two are in the Met.

After the research, I started to draw the sketch of the mask that I want to make.

Then I began to make the mask and below are the process.

I used Plastilina to form the base of the mask, this step focused on the overall shape.

The next step was applying plaster cloth on the Plastilina base.

However, I had a lot of challenges when the plaster cloth dried and I took it off from the base.

In the back, some Plastilina stuck firmly on the plaster cloth.

I was able to take out the Plastilina in the central part but I had to leave the Plastilina in the horns.

What is more, the plaster cloth broke seriously and fell in parts that I had to reapply several layers after taking it off from the base.

Upon all the fix above, I was able to apply color to my mask.

Firstly, I was thinking about having two slightly different colors in two halves.

But the differences in the two halves were not obvious after I applied the colors white and gold to the mask. In the positive thought, the use of white and gold give a strong sense of tribes and that is exactly what I want.

I applied red on the forehead and eyebrow parts of the mask.

I painted the nose, cheek, and lip with red.

Then I painted the eyeballs to make them looks half-opened as planned.

At this point, I got feedback from Bryan that it looks kind of in the middle of new and old. I quickly decided to make it look old and Bryan taught me a technique to apply on the mask and make it looks dirty and aged. I bought the materials that I need after class and below was how the mask looks like after applying the technique.

I found that my mask is a little bit limited in material. So I added hemp rope at the sides of the mask.

Then again I applied the technique to make the hemp ropes look old.

This is how it looked like.

In the group critique, I got feedback that the mask had a weak connection to my partner. It was hard for them to tell the connections. Bryan and I discussed a lot about how to enhance the connection in class, and I chose to use the materials below to add symbols on the mask.

And this is the mask’s final look.

• What was most successful about my project was the antique look. People said it looks like the masks in Met.
• The challenge I had was the connection between my mask and my partner. It was challenging because the antique look of the mask is hard to be connected with a modern person. People said the mask is cool and they said there could be enhancement in connection, but they couldn’t tell how. It took me quite a while to think how to achieve the connection without destroying the antique feeling.
• What I learned from this project/making activity was carefully considering all the requirements before starting to design and make the project.
• What I heard in critique was the connection between my mask and my partner was poor. It was helpful because this was a very important direction for me to improve about.