In a moment of insanity, we chose to make these box heads during the last 2 weeks of 7th grade art- a bold move considering the fact that school could end, and we wouldn't be done. Many of these students' parents work at the school, however, and these dedicated students came to paint their projects on their first days off from school! We used boxes, sheets of cardboard, plaster bandages, and regular plaster. The bird head was built on a cookie tin. We padded the boxes (and the tin) with bunched up newspaper, wadded with tape before the plastering began. The only caution: make sure that the taped portion is quite smooth, because if you try to compensate later with plaster, chunks of plaster may flake or fall out later. The plaster should really be a skim coat to smooth the bandages, not a layer. We used tempera paint, but I think that house paint would help secure all of the layers and give it permanence. Students could take them home if they wanted to, but if they thought that they wouldn't keep them, I offered to store them for use at another time. (See Festivals posts).
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