Directions for making paper sculpture masks!

Basic directions for creating paper sculpture masks:
1. Use cardstock. Bright colors and black. Black cardstock is a great foundation for color pencil work and background for bright color attachments.

First decision: pick a sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 inch color cardstock. It is always fun to see what color different children pick. Cardstock can come in such intense colors.

2. Fold your piece of cardstock in half: will you be a long face (like a hotdog) or a wide face (like a hamburger)?

3. From one of the corners of your folded cardstock to the opposite, diagonal corner, tear or cut the paper. Tearing leaves an organic rough edge, cutting leaves a smooth sharp edge. When you open your folded paper you should now have a basic triangular shape. The beginning of a face!

4. Poke holes in your mask where you want the eyes to be. You can do this with a pair of pointed scissors by drilling carefully into the cardstock. With a little hole poked you now have room to insert your scissors or fingers and cut or tear an eye shape.

5. Paper and cardstock can CURL as well as bend, fold, twist, crinkle! Look at your left over pieces and also pick some other color pieces of cardstock to experiment with. They can be attached to your basic mask shape with a glue stick or hot-glue gun.

6. Get into your craft supply box and also decorate with feathers, glitter, rope, trim, etc. Colored pencils on cardstock create some great tapestry and texture.

7. When you are done you can display your mask on the wall or bulletin board with push pins. It is important to pin one side of your mask to the wall and then bend the mask a bit at the fold before you pin the other side. This gives a 3-D look to your paper sculpture mask. Don’t hang it FLAT against the wall. A 3-D mask is more interesting as light in the room casts shadows and accentuates shapes.