World Masks – Facepainting Workshop

I had a wonderful experience yesterday sharing this art of transformation with a enthusiastic group of High School students. First I did a one hour presentation of my Transformation Lecture for a very attentive audience of art students.

Then we did a facepainting training session with a select group of the students, first demonstrating the application technique and then having them work in pairs to paint each other’s faces. After that it was students painting students, as the High School artists had the chance to paint several classes of Elementary School students, from pre-K to grade 4.

We were in an inspiring setting, surrounded by the students’ artwork on exhibit for their annual art and music festival. With the opportunity for each of them to paint several faces their confidence and creativity grew over the course of the session. In between the groups of younger students, the artists would add to and refine the faces they had painted on each other, creating several examples of striking designs. One of the joys I derive when teaching facepainting to new students is how they surprise me with what they create. Working without the pre-conceptions of experienced facepainters, they will combine colors and design elements with such freedom that I wind up learning from my students.

Using traditional tribal designs as the models for the facepainting helps move the students past concerns about their ability as painters and fosters that sense of creative freedom. Tribal faces don’t need to look like any specific thing — they are celebrations of colors, lines, dots and shapes in any way the artist chooses. I share with them my belief that more important than what you paint on someone’s face is how they feel about being painted, and encourage the artists to make a connection with the child they are painting. Before each class came in to be painted, I talked with the younger kids about how wild they would look, in designs from tribal cultures around the world, and that their High School student artist wasn’t even going to ask them what they want to be because every face is a surprise. I can safely say that a good time was had by all. The artists did great job and we all enjoyed seeing how excited the kids were to look into the mirror and see the creative works of art they had become.

To learn about the lecture program: https://thestorybehindthefaces.com/lecture/

For more info on the tribal faces that we used as inspiration, see: https://thestorybehindthefaces.com/2011/04/12/traditional-facepainting-world-masks-workshop/