Elsa Rhae

Professional Creative

Pop Art - My First Face

Elsa RhaeComment

My first face paint of all time was inspired by, Roy Lichtenstein, who inspired the thousands of pop art face paint works. It was the beginning of my last Spring semester at KU and I had enrolled in my final elective course of my college career, Stage Makeup 101. I was disappointed by the first class, where we were given a syllabus and the out line of work we would be doing through the semester. Old age, animals, highlighting and contouring, among others. Pretty dull I felt. I had enrolled in the class after seeing YouTube videos of Kandee Johnson transforming into an Avatar so I knew there were plenty more creative uses for my required $50 stage makeup kit. 

That evening after classes and work, I sat on the floor of my apartment and began googling images of the pop art face paint I had seen so many times prior. With the back of my paint brush I began applying the iconic red chicken pox all over my face and finishing with the black line work. I took out my fairly new Panasonic GH2 camera and snapped a few photos under the yellow, incandescent light bulbs in the bathroom.

oldpopartface

The following year, after being introduced to Sister Act Face Painting and learning about high quality, water based face paints, I gave my pop art face a second shot with photographer friend, Jim Grace, present to document. Perhaps I will make this face a yearly tradition. We will see this January!