Lions and Artists

The Comedy Mask
Last night, I made five tiny portraits of famous Venetians.
I chose five men who are all well-known and easily recognisable:
Claudio Monteverdi (composer)
Carlo Goldini (playwright)
Guacamo Casanova (author - and notorious lothario!)
Giovani Antonio Canaletto (artist) and
Tiziano Vecelli (other wise known as Titian) and I think we know what he's famous for!
They are about an inch square and I used PhotoShop to put them in little frames. Then I applied a good layer of varnish to them before I went to bed.
This morning I cut them out and painted a thin ring of gold around the edge - et voila! Five portraits to hang in my miniature Venetian Gallery.

So, along with the curtains I made yesterday and the piece of manuscript I kept back from when I made the background (varnished in preparation) and a strip of red felt (for a red-carpeted staircase)  I was ready to mock-up the inside of my 'comedy' mask to see how it would look.

There was just one more thing I wanted to add. The phrase "Ladies and Gentlemen, please take your seats. The performance is about to start" translated into Italian and added to the edges.

I use Google Translator for this as my Italian is minimal at best and I didn't want to get my grammar or spelling wrong!

So, I printed off the phrase, treated the torn paper to a tea bath and waited for it to dry.

Finally, I made and a couple of curtain ties made from gold wire and brass feather charms (which were lying around in the studio.) Then I put it all together.

The Lion of Venice

I applied the background felt yesterday with PVA glue. I like PVA. It is a good glue, but I probably use it too much and could have used a different material to paste the felt to the inside of this mask. It has worked, but it took ages to dry.

However, today it was ready for me to trim the excess felt from the edges and start applying the details.

I used self-adhesive black felt for the nose, eyes and mouth. It was much easier to use this than to fiddle about with gluing tiny pieces of felt into place, not to mention time-saving.

Now, I thought this looked OK, but I wanted it to look more lion-like, so I rummaged around for something to create that lovely white furry bit lions have around their mouths.

I never throw anything away if I think it might be useful (which is nearly everything!) and I'm glad of that because I had a nice scrap of untreated fleece. Not the stuff you make hoodies out of, this is the real deal, straight off a sheep (probably about 20 years ago!)

I glued it on (with Copydex this time - not PVA!) and then stuck a lion's mane of faux fur around the edge. 

And finally, the first two masks are complete.