Paper Mache Dragon Pair- Jaws and Tongue
So it's taken me a while to get these jaws made. I want you to know that I haven't been sitting still. I've just completed a project for a new blog. It's the "political action" arm of my paper mache empire. Check it out at Paper Mache Pigs .
Newly cloth mached jaws.
Here are the jaws that I made. One set will be for the female dragon, and one for the male. If you've ever watched my videos you'll recognize what I'm doing. I cut open the mache balls and hollowed them out. I taped the underside of the tapered half-tongues. Normally I would bend these into the shape I wanted at this point, but this time I must wait till the dragons are assembled to see how the tongues will "relate" to one another. Then I cloth mached the two half jaws for each dragon. As you can see I am still doing pre-assembly work. It is time consuming and isn't a lot of fun. But now I'm ready to start putting the dragons together. Things will move much faster from here. Stay tuned. Total work time so far, 11 hours.
Paper mache "shells", teeth, tongue pieces.
Teeth hot glued toshell.
Teeth hot glued toshell.
Newly cloth mached jaws.
Posted by Dan the Monster-man at 5/3/2010 2:40 PM 
Categories: Paper Mache Dragon Pair
Tags: paper mache dragons monsters sculpture papier mache art technique art
Categories: Paper Mache Dragon Pair
Tags: paper mache dragons monsters sculpture papier mache art technique art
Hey, haven't heard from you in a while! These are looking great so far - even if they are in the infant stages of development.
I've been trying to come up with my own idea of what you're trying to do here. I know you said that the dragons are going to be twisted together, and you just said there's going to be a male and a female? Is it going to be like a yin yang? I can't wait to see when it's finished.
Sadly, I haven't been able to work on my project at all. I've paper mached maybe 6 pieces and they've sat for over a month now. But the semester ends in two weeks which means I'll finally have some time to finish it. I'll let you know how it's coming as time progresses.
Take care!
Lindsey
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Hi Lindsey,
Nice to hear from you! I hope all is well with school. Listen, it's hard to manage a life and do the art too, no matter who you are. Don't worry if you have a few unfinished projects around. They will call you when you get the time. I'm just trying to do to much all at once which is why this one seems to be crawling along. As I mentioned, I just finished a really fun project to launch my new blog. I know, I know, one must wonder why I'd start a new blog when I can hardly keep current on this one. But I take the long view. I like each of the three projects I have going, and they will all get done. So will yours. No doubt about it.
Good luck. Keep in touch.
Dan
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Dan, I met you at the Bellevue Art Fair in the late 1980's, and bought The Simple Screamer then. All these years I have held onto your book. I lent it to my daughter's art teacher just yesterday with strong admonitions not to loose it. Imagine my surprise when the teacher told me its available on Amazon, and you're still making monsters.
What a delight to find your web site-it is fantastic, and I'm so glad you are still The Monster Man. I can't believe I have not made a Screamer! I'm yearning to be on your wall of fame. I'll send a photo, if and when.
Best, Lynn (the frog lady)
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Hi Lynn,
So nice to hear from you! Thank you for the nice note. I hope you do get around to making a Screamer. You would really enjoy it I think.
And yes, I'd love a photo!
Keep in touch!
Dan
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Hi Dan, Well like so many before me, I happen to stumble upon your site (from your pics on about dot com., and boy am I ever glad I did! As others have stated I was in a kinda slump, searching for inspiration and your creations have blown me away, I am in inspiration overload! I had to make myself go to bed at 3 in the morning and when I got up I was right back here taking in every single video and blog post! Now to put that in action, ha ha, hard to do as we are all so busy trying to pay our way just to live. I hope to find time soon. I had a couple questions, one is... what are the "shells" you are using as teeth? I was hoping to see or hear that in any of the video's, maybe I missed that part? and 2, you say you use flour and water paste in the video's but all your blog entries say you use white glue? Which is your choice or do you just use what ever you happen to have or a specific part of the process? I love seeing the video's, aside from your super entertaining commentary (you are a funny guy!) and shots of those kewl cats, I really enjoy actually seeing how you are doing the steps, so much easier to understand than pictures. Can't wait to see them come summer! I also love to see the creations from others, that is so super that you put those on for all of us to see..And Thank you sooo much for sharing your great methods! I am so excited! suz
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Hello Suz,
What a nice comment! Thank you very much. It inspires me that you were up at 3 in the morning thinking about art! I'll try to answer your questions. First, most of the teeth in the videos are made out of a plastic material called "Fimo". You mold it and bake it in the oven. You can see me doing that in a few of the videos. There are other brands of similar material. You can get it in places that sell hobby supplies. I sculpt with paper mache balls and appendages. I use flour and water paste to make those. I cut them up and assemble them into a sculpture. But the final "skin" on my projects is cloth dipped into glue. I use old bed sheets that I tear up and white glue. Here the major brand of white glue is called "Elmer's". But it is just any hobby or all purpose glue that you can buy in hobby or hardware stores. I call that process "cloth mache" for lack of a better term. I started doing it years ago when i was working with kids. The projects were brittle and would break. I wanted something to make them stronger. It turned out that everyone could find one used bed sheet. And the white glue was available at the school. It worked extremely well for detail and strength.
I hope you find some time to do this kind of art. It is very satisfying. Of course finding time is not easy for anyone. I always seem to have more going on than time to work on them.
Good luck. And thanks again.
Dan
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FIMO is a brand of polymer clay. You can also use Premo or Sculpey 3. Polymer clay can be found at almost any craft store and also online.
I haven't had a chance to play with it much - but there's a glow in the dark polymer clay from Premo that would make really cool teeth.
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Thank Emily,
Yes, I use the Fimo version of glow in the dark. The color is kind of creamy, very nice for dragon teeth. Every night, when I turn off the lights, I have mouths full of glowing teeth shining in the dark. It's pretty cool.
Dan
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Thanks Dan (and Emily), great, I have fimo that still may be workable in my studio, I knew I would use it someday! LOL...which reminds me now I can use the "regular" teeth I made from fimo (also in that box). OK, I see, Flour in the building/paper stage and glue for the sheet covering..I didn't catch that. I took in alot of info on the days watching and checking out all your stuff. Wonder how and where I missed the part about using fimo for teeth? I swear I didn't miss a video or blog post!
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I'm elated to have found your site! I live in New Orleans, and I costume a lot. I have a million ideas for paper mache heads - the first one I'd like to tackle is for a protest coming up. I guess you've heard about this oil spill destroying our livelihoods, ecosystem, and cultural traditions. Well, I'd like to make a pelican head and douse it in oil for the protest. Your videos have been useful, and I have some ideas about how to start, but I wonder if you could give me some advice about how to make my pelican wearable (on my head). How do I attach my pelican to the top of my head? Thanks for taking the time to make these videos.
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Hello Cynthia,
Nice to meet you. Of course, we are all observing the mess in the Gulf. Unbelievable. I'm sure BP will fix everything once they've finished pointing fingers at everyone else.
I'm sorry to say that large, mardi-gras type heads are outside my area of expertise. It definitely takes some engineering. It seems to me that you must start by building an armature on your head and work out. If the pelican head is large, you'll have to use your shoulders. You don't want to move a lot of weight around with just your head. I think I would use aluminum rods (you can get these at Home Depot) and pipe clamps to construct a basic armature. Maybe use belts around the head and lots of foam. Like I said, I've never really done this kind of thing. But that is just a guess. There must be a number of people who live around New Orleans who make heads like that during Mardi-gras. Perhaps someone could show you how to make an armature.
Sorry, this isn't what you wanted to hear. I hope it works out for you.
Good luck with all of it.
Dan
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Amazing! I stumbled across the Ignite video and ended up here. I just read the question about the pelican head and thought I could help.
I did one papier mache project in my life (other than the obligatory balloons thing in grade school), it was about 20 years ago when I made a unicorn head for my 7-yr-old to wear for halloween. (She wanted to go as a unicorn, she was obsessed with them.) Her tail and hooves were made out of yarn and construction paper, and the mane was made out of the same rainbow-colored yarn.
I used the lightest chicken wire I could find for the "armature" and just kept building it up. I left room for my daughter's head so she'd wear it like a hat, with her eyes underneath the unicorn's jaw. I wound lots of masking tape around the bottom part so the chicken wire wouldn't cut into her scalp, and believe it or not we used pot holders as shims to get it to balance right on her head! LOL oh the poor thing. But she was the hit of her class's halloween parade, it stayed on just fine, like a heavy hat.
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Hello AMC.
Thanks for sharing about the unicorn. I do like chicken wire and masking tape for that kind of application. As you said, it is really light and you can bend it to conform to a face or scalp.
Take care
Dan
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Hello, I'm brasilian and i loved your work. His technique has helped me very much in decoration that i made birthday to my son and years past. Want a vc increasingly successful. Godspeed.
Excuse my poor English
Hélida.
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Thank you Hélida,
I am happy that you like my art work. Thank you for the nice comment. I really appreciate it.
Dan
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Amazing website! Thank you Monster Man.
I just started doing paper mache.I start making pinatas, some of the egg like shells I made with balloons got too hard..I have been calling them dinosaur eggs. I did not realize just how hard paper mache gets. The possibilities are endless. I love the tutorial on the dragon feet, hands etc.This is by far the best website I have seen so far.Thank you for sharing As artist we all know you have to make a few before you get it just right . You have saved us so much time and frustration. I just found your website today, Will be back checking often. I really like the dragon feet and hands. And the idea of making monsters is fabulous! You just can't go wrong when it is your original creation, I love it.Thanks again.
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Hi Gloria,
Nice to meet you! Thank you for the nice comment. I really appreciate it. Keep in touch. Paper mache artists have to stick together.
Dan
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Mr. Reeder - WOW!!!!!!!! What an AWESOME job!!! Wicked stuff! You did a fantastic job uniting the two so that they look natural and real. Just a stupendous job with this. Congratulations and I hope the waterfront sells you a few of these magnificent specimens. I'm still making dragons!!!
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Hey Stephane,
That is a wonderful boost to my artistic ego coming from a master dragon maker. Thank you!!
Dan
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Wow! This one really turned out nice! I love the colors.The blue eyes go perfect with this piece.I really like the glass eyes.I think they give them more life.
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Why thank you Mona! I know you know the value of good eyes. I must say that I always feel funny buying eyes from an industry that I don't like. When I buy "lion eyes" I know that most everyone who buys them is killing a lion. Who on this Earth would kill a lion?! But I can't make such beautiful glass eyes on my own.
Hope your art is going well. Thanks for checking in.
Dan
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Hey, Dan! I am a very big fan of your work. I'm an elementary school art teacher and I'm using your site and your books to make (small) dragon trophies with sixth graders. I showed them some of your videos and they went nuts! Needless to say, a lot is riding on my ability to teach them how to do this stuff, and I've got a few questions after making my own. First off, when I "skinned" my dragon, the cloth didn't wrinkle as nicely as I thought it would and seemed stiff. It also slightly lifted off of the head unless I was constantly pressing it back on, especially around the lips. And, the seams show quite a bit (the cloth doesn't seem to want to stick to itself). Is this all because my cloth is too thick? I'm using a thin piece of cotton cloth, but it's new, not worn out like a sheet would be.
Also, is it possible to thin the glue slightly and get good results? I have to make a little go a long way!
Thanks so much for your help!!
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Hello Livia,
Nice to meet you. I prefer old sheets for precisely the reasons you mentioned. The newer the sheet the more it will resist staying in place. I get my sheets at a "thrift" store and look for the oldest, most worn sheet they have. Usually these are the cheapest as well. I also use the glue full strength for the same reason. Everything just stays in place with thicker glue. I hope this helps a bit.
Good luck. You are a saint for doing this with kids. I did it for years so I know how much work it can be.
I'd love to see photos when you are finished. Just keep it in mind.
Take care
Dan
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If you cut the old sheets on the bias they conform to curved surfaces better.
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Hello Tirzah,
I'm not sure what a "bias" is. I'd like to know. Thank you for the advice.
Dan
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