Face Painting — Kids for Kids Event — Inspirations from Africa and India, including Rangoli

the Indian folk art of Rangoli

In November, at the Kids-for-Kids Family Carnival to benefit the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric Aids Foundation http://www.pedaids.org/, we had another opportunity to develop new face designs in support of an event theme. This year the event had a travel theme (“Journey to End Pediatric Aids”), so we offered to paint in our “World Mask” theme of styles from world cultures. The client asked us to go further and feature specifically the countries in which the foundation has its programs: the U.S.; several nations of Africa; and India. For U.S. faces we would include some iconic scenic designs like the Statue of Liberty and for Africa I have an extensive resource of mask and bodyart images which I could mine to find images from the specific countries involved. So I took this thematic opportunity to do some new research into inspirations from India. In addition to collecting some additional imagery from the elaborate theatrical makeups of the Kerala region, I did some image research into the art of Rangoli. Rangoli is a folk art that relates directly to facepainting, featuring floral and nature designs that are bright, colorful and very ephemeral, painted on the floor with colored rice, flours, sands or flower petals as an auspicious act, creating sacred welcoming areas for Hindu deities.

Click here for a pdf of the sheet of India reference images I put together for my artists: Face_Painting_IndiaImages_agostinoarts

The first third of my book, Transformations! The Story Behind the Painted Faces, chronicles my investigation of cultural sources of face and body art, and how I have incorporated those discoveries into my work.

To learn more go to: https://thestorybehindthefaces.com/books/

Related articles:

the images of the Holi  festival are from this article:  http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2010/03/02/holi.DTL

From African Masks to Abercrombie & Fitch https://thestorybehindthefaces.com/2011/09/26/from-african-masks-to-abercrombie-fitch/

From a Mask to a Painted Face — Face Painting from Cultural Sources https://thestorybehindthefaces.com/2011/09/12/812/

Rangoli

Rangoli

I painted the rangoli style peacock on the left, Naoko (I think) did the one in the middle, and on the right, Lorraine abstracted the peacock and mixed it with the images of the girl's shirt

Dimitrea painting a Kerala styled design

face by Dimitrea

My version of a classic bodhisatva image

Holi Festival cancept

Naoko painting

I took this makeup for the god Shiva from a traditional illustration of Hindu writings

an example of the theatrical makeup from the Kerala region of India

from the Holi festival or "Festival of Colors"

Holi Festival

Jennifer had the really brilliant idea of using the figures on one of the foundation's posters as the inspiration for these two faces

Lorraine painted one the musician's performing there in a Spirt Mask

based on a Ngere face design

Buffalo Mask, Bobo people

Jennifer and I were both experimenting with putting the full masked dancing figure on the face, rather than just imitating the mask

A Yoruba design, associated with healing

Jennifer's Yoruba inspired design

Surma people, Omo River region

Omo River region

Omo River region

The face styles of the various Omo River cultures are a continuing source of new designs

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Halloween Face Painting — Photos from the Company

Extra Spooky Ghoul by Laura

There just weren’t enough faces to paint this weekend. I have a very disappointed company of artists. Roberta feeling bad that she had no chance to paint some of the real scary stuff because both her events were “snowed out” — Laura frustrated that she couldn’t paint the Day of the Dead faces she’d been researching. At some of the events that did go on, only a handful of people showed up due to the extreme and surprising weather. In the limited opportunities, a bunch of the artists were good enough to take photos and send me some, a selection of which are here, including faces from Lorraine, Jennifer, Britt, Christine, Laura and one of our newest members, Colleen, who contributed a really cool skeleton design. I think Laura wins the  “spookiest” award, with her “Extra Spooky Ghoul” face. Jennifer continues to forge ahead into new design concepts for all of us by continuing to apply the lessons we are learning from fine art paintings to new themes such as her “Gauguin Witch“. And Lorraine’s juxtaposition of the face of the Statue of Liberty with the New York skyline is something we can use all year round.

If you paint faces, take photos. You will learn more from looking at your own work than from any teacher. Retain the successes, learn from the failures. Try designs again, even the failures. And don’t be afraid to try something new. I am very happy that all the artists that work with me don’t just paint the same designs I do — i learn from them as much as they learn from me.

Yo-Yo Ma was on Colbert the other night, and he had some advice for all of us who do any art. Talking about the new group he’s working with, and their new album “The Goat Rodeo Sessions”, he said they all want “to do something very well”, but he also said they always wants to take risks, “to go to the edge where you see a better view”.

Tribal Zombie by Laura

Spiderman by Colleen

Skeleton by Colleen

Statue of Liberty watching New York by Lorraine

Gauguin Witch by Jennifer

Princess by Jennifer

Zombie by Christine

Ghoul Girl by Colleen

Ghoul by Colleen

Ghosts in Graveyard by Lorraine

Flamingo Lily by Laura

Tree by Britt

New York Dancing Couple by Jennifer

Biplane by Laura

Alien 3 Eyes by Christine

Half Dead by Laura

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