Mask- Work

Explore Your Personas and Come to Know Yourself More Deeply

The Benefits of Mask-Work

Mask-Work opens us to the many layers of our psyche in a fun, creative, and safe way. Mask-making develops our artistic skills, stimulates our imagination, develops self-awareness, and promotes positive healing in our lives. It gets us to see that we are multi-faceted and complex beings and that our many personas and life experiences (including traumas) can be used as fertile soil for the imagination to flourish.

Art therapy is a technique rooted in the idea that creative expression can foster healing and mental well-being. Making art helps us explore emotions, cope with stress, boost self-esteem, and work on social skills. It gives us the opportunity to consider ourselves as artists and our lives as novels. How exciting is that? Imagine taking the most insecure, wounded, fragile part of yourself and transforming these aspects into beauty, comedy, wisdom, and love. Our so-called weakness becomes our strengths and shifts our perceptions. The act of creating opens our energy channels and transforms pain and old conditioning in our psyche into empowering insight, happiness, and well-being. Eventually, we are able to step back from the subjective nature of our experiences and become the witness. This is freedom!

What is Mask-Work?

Mask-Work is a form of expressive art whereby a three-dimensional, wearable, papier-mache face is created and its character is explored and brought to life with a voice, physicalization, personality, and psychology. The purpose of making the mask is multi-faceted, but mostly we make it to express and explore our own inner personas. The mask becomes an extension of the one who creates it.

Mask-Work opens us to the many facets of our being which enables us to dive deep into our stories, our traumas, our beliefs, our strengths and vulnerabilities, and our inherent wisdom. The purpose of expressive arts (as opposed to making art as a commodity), is to delve into process- not product. We do this in a safe, creative, playful, and meaningful way. We may not always find it easy to befriend and express ourselves, but doing so through a mask can be exciting, endearing, hilarious, and revealing.

Although masks are ubiquitous in art therapy, there is often some confusion as to their purpose. Are they meant to hide or protect some aspect of ourselves? Do they help us uncover and discover parts of ourselves that are repressed? Do they exaggerate our personalities giving us permission to be larger than life? I would say "yes" to all these questions but most importantly, the role of the mask is to reveal. It gives us permission to act out scenarios and say what we need to say. When we put on the mask, there is no holding back! So while we may sometimes hide behind a mask, mask-work (as a form of art therapy) helps us to step out from the shadow and into the light! Remember that what we often hide from others is our brilliance, our humor, our wisdom, and our talent, so in this regard, mask-work is a modality used to step into our power and celebrate ourselves.

Another very important aspect of mask-work is using these "alter egos" to engage in deep conversation with ourselves. When we create a mask, the mask becomes an archetypal aspect of us. Having a conversation with the mask is the same as having a conversation with ourselves. But because the mask is external and somewhat theatrical, it is easier to engage in dialogue with the mask. This is where a skilled coach/expressive arts facilitator (like myself) can guide you into unchartered territory and shed light on the parts of the self that are unconscious. Whether you are working with your mask or one that I made, you can engage in the mask work and learn more about yourself in order to heal, grow, overcome, and get empowered.

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Mask Offerings:

Exploring Archetypes Through Mask: (next course date TBA)

This workshop explores the universal archetypes that live within us and express themselves as personalities that manifest as both light and shadow. Please join Barbara Dametto and Natalia Brajak for a morning/afternoon of playful physical theater, archetypal character investigation, and papier-mache mask exploration. Participants will have the opportunity to delve into their own understanding of what Carl Jung referred to as: “Innate, unlearned patterns of influence that shape the self.” This workshop is suitable for anyone who is curious about self-exploration, expressive arts, and different healing modalities.

About Mask Work:

Mask work is a form of expressive arts therapy that opens us to the many layers of our psyche in a fun, creative, and safe way. It is the process of exploring our personal personas (archetypes) by delving into the psychology and characterization of 3-dimensional, wearable, papier mache masks. Mask work allows us to investigate aspects of ourselves that perhaps are unrealized or unexpressed. We do this through guided techniques and exploratory processes that encourage us to befriend the masks in ways that are fun, creative, curious, and deep.

Note: While this work is therapeutic in nature, it is not a substitute for therapy.

What You Will Learn:

How to warm up your voice and body in order to prepare for physical theater.
Which archetypal character is prominent in your life and what it can teach you.
How to dialogue with a papier mache, wearable mask.
How to uncover meaningful insights about your ego constructs.
How to bring your archetypal character to life in a playful, theatrical, interactive, and imaginative way.
How to befriend your shadows.
How to fall in love with the parts of yourself that sometimes seem unlovable.

About The Facilitators:

Barbara Dametto is an experienced workshop facilitator, expressive arts practitioner, theater mask-maker, performing artist, clown, dancer, and spiritual guide. Barbara will take participants through an experience of self-discovery and inner wisdom.

www.breathetrue.com

Natalia Brajak is an experienced psychotherapist registered with the CRPO. She will bring her professional support and guided facilitation to the workshop enabling participants to dive safely and deeply into the psychological aspects of parts of personalities.

https://nataliabrajak.com/

We will be moving so wear comfortable clothes.
We will be writing, so bring a pen and a journal.
We will be wearing papier mache masks so no lipstick (and bring something to tie back your hair with.)
We will be dressing up, so bring a few fun hats, scarves, and articles of clothing that can be shared.
We will be exploring Expressive Arts, so bring an open mind!

Cost: $150

Six-Week Program:

This multi-themed workshop takes place over six weeks. The final, culminating activity is mask-making and character development. I offer this program in person or via Google Meet. For more information, click here.

Cost: $800

Un-Masking Sessions:

Unmasking Session: Choose one of my masks that you are most drawn to, put it on, and sit in front of a mirror. I will guide you through a series of character development instructions and questions. These sessions are powerful experiences whereby you (the client) surrender your personal character and allow the wisdom of the mask to come through in order to help you better understand a situation in your life. These 1 hour-long sessions are experienced in person at my studio in Guelph (although I can also come to you. We will need access to an open, private room and a large mirror).

Cost: $120

About Masks

Used for protection, disguise, entertainment, and ritual practices, the earliest use of masks (700 B.C.) was for religious and shamanic rituals and ceremonies.

The tradition of theatre masks goes back to the ancient Greeks, who used masks both for practical needs and dramatic performances. They were also used in commedia dell'arte (Italian theatre), and Japanese theatre and have a long history in almost every culture throughout the world. Masks can be beautiful or grotesque, but they are always evocative.

The use of masks is varied and unique and can be found on the theatre stage, in the artist's studio, in a religious rite of passage, or in a therapeutic environment. Psychodrama, for example, uses a dramatic approach to artistically and skillfully "play out" certain scenes in a person's life through role-playing, enactment, impersonation, and improvisation. In this environment, masks can be used for the purpose of assisting people in dealing with different (often traumatic) aspects of their lives.

Ultimately, masks illuminate what lies beneath the surface and help us realize that we are complex personas born out of fortunate and unfortunate life circumstances. By bringing these disconnected aspects of self into the light and playfully animating them (acting them out), deep healing, understanding, and self-acceptance can occur. So if you are open and ready to dive into your creativity and befriend what dwells "beneath the mask", let's play!

Check out my blog article I wrote on masks.

Meet my Earth Goddess Mask Treesha

Welcome to My Cast of Characters!

I am a mask maker and sacred clown. When I make a mask and develop its character, it becomes an aspect of myself. Each mask is an extension of my personas. Each of them is unique and each has a certain "flavor" and personality. I love them all as they are my wise and wacky friends and teachers. I confide in them and ask them for advice on a regular basis. They make me laugh, cry and fall in love. They offer me beauty, insight, courage, and humor. I refer to them as "sacred clowns" because they are truth-tellers, they are child-like, they are wise gurus and they are ubiquitous shit disturbers.

They are created with papier-mache, mixed media, and acrylic paint. Once completed, I put the mask on, sit in front of a mirror, look into my own eyes, and delve into a dialogue. I ask questions like- Who are you? What do you want? Where do you live? What is your message for Barbara? I take the mask into a breath, a sound, a word or sentence, a gesture, and a gait (walk). I put my own character and ego aside and I let the mask emerge in a unique way.

Eventually, I sit in front of a camera and let the mask say what it wants to say. To my surprise, they offer me guidance and advice. They are wise and loving and sometimes ruthless with me. They are an endless source of creativity, expression, and self-exploration.

While none of the masks on my website are for sale, I am happy to create one for you and/or provide a mask and characterization workshop for small groups of people (which typically take place over the span of a weekend).

Please remember that masks are tools for therapeutic work. They serve to reveal truths and insights about the wearer and the human condition. Some masks are serious, some are playful, some are tragic, some are light, some are ruthless and some are quirky. But ALL are a reflection of the human experience so wear and explore masks at your own risk!

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