Exploring Picasso part 1/4 - Masks

So my lifeskills/DEV class are going to look at the works of one of the worlds most famous, challenging and controversial artists - Pablo Picasso.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=at2PCxI72FU

We started with a video slide show of some of Picasso's work - emphasis the freedom, the fun, the rearrangement of space and facial features and the exciting colours.


We also looked at African Masks as a major inspiration for Picasso's style - using the faces from Les Damoiselle D'Avignon as a great example. One of the EA's actually brought in some actual masks for the kids to see as well.

We then inflated some Baloons and proceeded to paper mache them using this project as a guideline. And HERE is the PDF for the artzooka lesson!

We used PVA glue and water as our Mache medium because it is cheap, safe, stable and easy.  We did layers on 2 days and some kids chose to add sections of cardboard or egg carton to make eyes and noses.

We collected egg shells and coffee grounds with the help of staff to use in our finishes.  I baked the coffee grounds in the oven at 350 for an hour and it dried out well.

Once the glue was dry we painted them brown with Acrylic paint and then mapped out the areas where the eggs are to go in black (some used paint and some used big permanent markers). White glue again became the tool of choice for adding the eggshell and coffee grounds to these pieces. It gave them an amazing tactile surface.

Here are some of the masks the kids made:

It took a while but was a huge amount of fun. The kids really enjoyed getting their hands into it with the messy glue, cracking the shells and sprinkling the coffee! Awesome project all around.