Conceal and Reveal : Masks

click here to learn more about what influenced my masks :-)

For this task, we had to create masks in 6 hours. We were encouraged to explore what masks can represent, what their uses are (e.g. for religious purposes) and how they can conceal/reveal things, emotions etc...

My first mask was made using chicken wire/ coloured paper/ marker pen/ collage/ wooden ladybirds/ wool/ pompoms. I took a playful approach as I wanted to make this mask lighthearted, and I think using more 'crafty' materials got this idea across. The face was a found image of a cartoon from a magazine, which feels uncanny when taken out of its original context.

My inspiration was similar to Guerrilla Girls' inspiration - feminism and the male gaze. They influenced me to want to make a mask that was unapologetically feminine, 'revealing' instead of 'concealing' being girly, regarding the internalised male gaze and misogyny that girls go through at a young age, that some (although not all) grow out of. It is based on my own experience of this - desperately wanting to be a tomboy as a child, subconsciously because boys were seen as 'more cool', but growing up to realise there's nothing wrong with being feminine. I also tried to make it sort of creepy and exaggerated hence the sinister, surreal face on the middle of the butterfly, reflecting the sinister nature of the patriarchy.
Through research, I was also influenced by Gillian Wearing and her exploration of identity. She explores how poeple 'mask; their authentic selves in public spaces, which is similar to women masking their femininity in fear that it won't be respected.

I ended up not really liking the outcome of this mask, but I could not place my finger on why. Maybe because I made it creepy, and although that was my outcome it still creeps me out, or because the elements of nature take away from the actual meaning, making it feel confusing. This may be because I did not have a plan, I just used the materials I had available to make something, which was intimidating but an interesting process and ended in a result I was not expecting.

As I had about 5 minutes left over, I made these two quick masks using cardboard and coloured paper. Again, I went with the flow with these masks, trying to use left over coloured paper I had.

There is not much meaning attached to these; they came from cutting out a swirl from a piece of paper, which resulted in making another swirl that fits together, which is why I made 2 masks. The materials I used were simple, again, because I was using what I had on hand. I think the colours add a softness to the mask, maybe linking the hearts and the feeling of falling in love.

I chose Rowan and Nick to model them because this time I wanted to control how the picture was taken. They naturally left a space between them which contrasts how the swirls on the masks fit together like a jigsaw.
The heart eyes remind me of an 'anonymous' mask or an emoji which suggests imagery of emotion or lack of emotion, dating sites, cat-fishing (lying about who you are online to a potential romantic partner) or online romance in general.

Overall, ironically, I prefer these masks to the first one that I spent more time on, probably because they are quite straightforward.