Friday, May 12, 2017

Lost and Found Masks.............

"Flower Deva Mask"

I've made so many masks over the years that I never found a story for, although perhaps those who bought them found their stories and continue to find "voice" for them.  Sometimes a face would just kind of  appear in my imagination, or in the woods, or while working in my garden,  insisting that I make a mask for that special Persona.  So I did, but never really learned more about what those personae had to say or tell or dance.  I  found some images of some of those masks in my files, and just had to share them here, at least, to share their names.  All of these masks have left me, sold or given away............I like to think they are happy with the faces I found for them...........  

"Butterfly Fairy" 

One of a series of very large "butterfly masks" I made for a photography  trade show in NYC.  I wish they had thought to send me a photo of some of the people who used the masks...........would have been fun!  



"Fire Elemental"

There was a time when I make many "Fire" masks, being very drawn to that element.


"Wood Elemental"  (from Devils Hopyard State Park, Connecticut)

Two mystical, magical, wonderful residencies at I-Park Artists Enclave in East Haddam,  Connecticut resulted in lots of masks that spoke to me from the woods, the ponds, the dappled light of an incomparable Summer Solstice there.


"Bone Being" (a Samhain mask)

A very old Pagan mask, one of the "Mother of Bones" Masks I used to make, the Crone aspect of the Goddess and the turning of the year into darkness.


"Hades"

I made a series of masks for the Elusinian Mysteries plays some people I know were staging in California, but they never used them, or even seemed to notice I had made them, so they ended up sold off at a Renaissance Faire.  Too bad, the series was rather beautiful, I wanted to make them look old and antique, and I think I succeeded fairly well.  This was Hades.


"Luna Moth"

This was a Luna Moth experience I had during one of my wonderful summers at Brushwood Folklore Center in Western New York.  I had never seen such a thing as a Luna Moth before, and finding one that was dying, I needed to at least celebrate it's incredible beauty.  So I kept it in a box and used it for the model of this mask.  When it died I gave it back to my favorite tree, feeling very blessed by that beautiful little life.

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