These are the masks the Artmaking as Playful Prayer participants made this week - we also did Touch Drawing (a type of intuitive mono-printing developed by Deborah Koff-Chapin) - which warmed people up. For me, the Touch Drawing always breaks things loose . . . and I think it made the mask-making much more organic. I'm really hoping to attend the in-depth Touch Drawing Workshop next summer . . . maybe tomorrow I'll post some of the ones I did this week.
With masks, we get to invent new identities and try on ancient archetypes. We get a chance to act out our own myths and stories. In some spiritual traditions, the masks worn to represent different deities in rituals and dances are considered too powerful for anyone save trained priests or shamans to wear. While poking around a friend's blog today, I found a link to the Endicott Studio, an on-line journal dedicated to mythic arts. Artwork that deeply engages us in the expression of myths. What a yummy thing for fall . . .
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Masks and Myths
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
they're great! i remember you talking about touch drawing and i'm happy to see it being used as a warm up. as a group, did you get a chance to"invent new identities and try on ancient archetypes" or "act out our own myths and stories" as part of this exercise?
endicott studio features terri windling, who i recognize through fairy tale collections she's edited & collaborated on. she's associated w/ brian & wendy froud, well-known fairy artists. (and charles vess, who is one of my favorite illustrators in any genre.)
Sadly, no, we didn't really get to do a lot with the masks . . . though I love the idea of a stream-of-consciousness written dialogue with the mask . . . We did the masks the same day as touch drawing . . . packed a lot in!!
we did masks today, too (so close to halloween, and with an "abundance" theme it gave me a chance to pull out all the boxes of stuff i usually keep out of sight! ;). we ended with the "i am the one who..." writing.
thought you might like this quote: "Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth. -Oscar Wilde"
Ooo - I do like that quote! Awesome!
Post a Comment