African Masks

Year 7 Art

Materials: Cardboard, Papier Mache, Acrylic Paint

As a lead up to this project students looked at African style masks which were obtained from the Internet.

They worked in their visual diaries to create thumb nail sketches of symmetrical mask designs. A black and white
paper collage example was made emphasizing the line of symmetry and positive and negative shapes. These were small
A6 black paper with A7 white pieces to cut and position on the line of symmetry.

The masks were made with larger card with a newsprint shape first cut out as a guide to outline.

The card was cut out and snipped in from the edge so that a rounded shape could be made by overlapping the card.

Extra card pieces, such as egg cartons and cardboard cylinders were attached with masking tape to create features. Next lesson
layers of newspaper were applied with papier mache glue, paying attention to gluing around the edges for strength.

The following lesson a layer of toilet paper was glued on. This refined the surface and added a fine texture.

The masks were painted with either black or white acrylic paint and later burnished with a dry brush and their choice of
metallic paint. This emphasized the detail and gave a fabulous metallic effect.

Finally holes were punched for hanging and some students used frayed twine to add hair details.
Maria Morabito
Sandringham College