Tag Archives: mask

Young Artist’s Club: Aboriginal Art

December 9, 2016Young Artists and Writers ClubAboriginal art, boxes, mask, masks, nature art, paint, wearable art

Our Young Artist’s Club studied aboriginal art last month. And what a sight to see their aboriginal masks!

Our young artist’s took cardboard boxes and paint, and engineered large, over-the-shoulder-style head masks. They could choose to embody their spirit animal, a nature object, or someone they wished to honor. Check them out!

We had a cat:

A dog (whose artist is inside, poking his fingers out of the eye holes to show you how he can see out):

And a squid, complete with fluttery, paper tentacles!

If you made a large-scale mask, what would you make? I think something about weather would be really cool!

Young Artists Club: Frida Kahlo

November 6, 2016Young Artists and Writers ClubDay of the Dead, Dia de los Muertos, Frida Kahlo, group art project, group craft, group craft project, Kahlo, mask, Sugar skull

Our club members loved learning about Frida Kahlo!

We combined learning about Frida Kahlo with some Dia de los Muertos activities. We decorated sugar skulls:

made Dia de los Muertos masks:

and made altars to our loved ones who’ve passed:

It’s hard to do our Young Artist’s Club justice with just pictures and a description; if you’re in Austin and in First Grade or older you’re welcome to join us! Call Kaye at 512-807-6863 to enroll.

Did you celebrate Day of the Dead? Send us pictures if you did, we’d love to see!

What We’re Making: Mardi Gras Masks and Beads

February 8, 2016Creativity/Spirituality, What We're MakingArt, beads, craft, mardi gras, mask, masks, necklace

Mardi Gras is upon us once again! We made festive masks and beaded necklaces with our groups last week.

Some tips if you’d like to do this activity with your own group:

We chose to do four different mask shapes; our participants love the variety!
You’re going to want good scissors to cut out the outsides of the masks, and a sharp craft knife to cut out the eye holes. Trust me on that part.
To help the cords stay put in the masks, we put a piece of tape over that area of the back of the mask before punching the holes. The tape doesn’t hold down the cord, but it does help reinforce the posterboard of the mask itself.
We actually tied the cord to one end of the mask ahead of time, even before the participants had decorated them, as it eliminated a step (we didn’t have to hand out cords that the participants would need to keep track of, nor tie them twice for every participant). Streamlining the process can be very helpful!
For the beaded necklaces, we pre-cut the cord to a certain length, and made a mark on the cord about two inches from the end (using white cord, we just added a dot with a marker). We then explained to the participants to please keep their beads between the two dots, so there is enough room to tie a knot. The visual reference seems to help.
Of course green, yellow, and purple are traditional Mardi Gras colors, and we mentioned that to our participants, but we provided markers, feathers, and sequins of all colors. Everyone could use whatever they gravitated toward that day.