Chinese Opera Masks
Sixth graders created plaster masks in the style of Chinese Opera Masks. They began by learning about Ancient Chinese folktales (related to their Social Studies curriculum) and how these have evolved into the stories of the modern day Chinese Opera. They looked at pictures of a variety of different Chinese masks and learned about the color symbolism that each mask has as it represents a character in the Opera.
After designing several of their own masks on paper, each student made a three-dimensional mask using plaster gauze. They painted their masks to show color symbolism and in some cases symmetery, similar to the Chinese masks they had observed.
If more time had been available, we would have added a background or frame to the mask, but we ran out of school year!
