Ball Masque Anyone?

With Carnival season in full swing and Mardi Gras on Tuesday, February 21st, New Orleans is gearing up for the annual parades (here is the schedule). It's always an exciting time to visit!

Here in Cleveland, we were just treated to a fabulous exhibit of Ball Masque invitations and posters from the '20s era at the Cleveland Public Library, our gorgeous main library downtown (more to come this weekend). The exhibit celebrated the 100th anniversary of The Kokoon Arts Klub, the rather controversial group of artists who embraced the new Modernist movement.

The Ball Masques were held as yearly fundraisers and were strict with their admittance: the costumes had to be created at home (no rentals allowed) and folks were turned away at the door if their costumes weren't historically accurate and in keeping with the theme.

Local hotels, dance halls, and auditoriums were transformed into glowing caverns with extensive decorations. 

The group started "Artist Curb Markets" which became a place for the "Kokooners" and other artists to sell their works during the Depression. The first Artist Curb Market was held in 1932, with 12,000 people attending and shopping.

Enjoy the art show!

Aren't these amazing?

A big Thank You the the Cleveland Public Library staff for a wonderful display! 

Your hard work and dedication shines through!

A Ball Masque

Recently, we worked on contributing part of the decor for 

a Ball Masque. The guests were very much into the mood and most wore carefully chosen and created masks- so fun to see! With Fat Tuesday just around the corner, I thought now would be the perfect time to share our masks and decor with you. 

Our assignment was to design and create six 

5' x 7 ' masks for placement around the periphery of the room. We also designed the entrance to the room, through which the guests walked between cocktails and dinner.

Come with me behind the scenes...

The first step was to design the faces. Hunter Elliott, a regular contributing artist at Pieter Bouterse Studio, took on the task and created the six beautiful mask sketches. They then needed to be enlarged and transferred to their canvases. Here is one face being projected onto two 4' x 8 ' sheets of plywood.

Following that, the muslin was glued onto the shaped plywood and coated with a layer of primer.

Here's part of the group in the middle of the process...

Here you can get an idea of just how big they were! Many, many hours were spent applying the numerous layers it took to take them from a blank canvas to a detailed face.

For the entrance walk through, we morphed a double-sided face mask we had taken a photo of in Venice and had it printed on canvas. We glued it to the custom frame and attempted to "mend" it as it had come in three parts and one seam was rather feisty. Since the color was not as desirable as we had hoped, we needed to re-paint the face.

Here it is in place before its special mood lighting was  turned on and focused. Of course, I missed that photo(!).

Here are the rest of the masks.

 

The evening was magical. Lots of candlelight and flowers and fruit topped the velvet runners.

 

The tall candlesticks were wood reproductions with 22K gold accents. Lower silver candlesticks, silver-flecked votives and pewter containers were also combined on the tabletops.

 

There is nothing like Mardi Gras season to put one into a festive mood, especially in the middle of a snowy winter that most of us have had!