A few weeks ago, I had this idea just come to me that I wanted to make felted masks. Now, to know me now is to not be at all surprised that I would felt something. I'm a voracious knitter, and I love felting--whether it's felting something I've knitted, or needle felting, or wet-felting. I just love it. But most people I know at this point in my life don't know that I used to make masks--plaster casts of my own face, which I then painted and embellished. It was a big project I was working on -- which I never completed -- to make 16 masks which each represented a different aspect of my persona. I got about half way through. They're in a box, which I think just got moved to mini-storage. Perhaps it was looking at them briefly as I dropped them off at the Space Max that rekindled the desire to make masks -- but with my current medium -- fiber.
What intrigues me about masks is that they both hide and reveal. They hide the wearer's face -- of course -- but through the vision of the artist and the actions of the wearer -- they reveal something much more intimate and personal than were one to be looking at the wearer's actual face.
I started right away -- just picked up wool and needles and begin to freehand knit a mask. It went quickly -- it came out just as I had imagined it in my mind's eye, and I felted it right away. I loved the way it came out -- especially the mouth. I've made 3 more, each with a different fiber, each playing with the shape of the face. I'm going to make a few more before I begin needle-felting them with patterns and symbols. I feel like they're -- or I'm -- not ready for that stage yet.
To use another fiber metaphor, I feel like this project is a very pivotal one for me -- one which weaves my past and present together. The warp is me -- the weft is my past, present and future -- anthropology, shamanism, symbolism, art, Judaism, fiber art, handwork. I will post more as they progress.
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