Fashionado

Penland School of Crafts is known for many wonderful things. Offering classes they call “Specials” is one of them.

Summer Session 2 brought the magnificent talents of instructors Clare Dolan and Erica Mott for a workshop they titled: Moving Faces: Puppetry & Portraiture.

I quickly turned into a “groupie” as I became enamored with the great energy and spirit that Clare, Erica and their wonderful students offered. Real people, real beautiful, from the inside out. I even helped make giant paper-maché masks ’til about 12:30am one night — and I don’t get dirty for just anyone!

The puppetry class focused on mask-making, dance and performance. They examined the “movement of expression” made by the face, using it as the foundation for their larger than life creations.

The giant scale of the masks, the stunning set of the grassy Penland knoll with the Blue Ridge Mountains as the backdrop, combined with the choreography of their end of session performance, which read like sculptures dancing. Movement, fluidity and fantasy!

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