Preparation
Select a range of beauty products (eyeliner, lipstick, nail varnish, hair extensions, fake tan, lashes etc) that you might find in your online or local store.
Get a big piece of thick card and use the beauty products to write, draw and make marks that express your feelings about the beauty industry.
Activity
1: Mash, Stir and Frame: cut up the images and text in the magazines that annoy or upset you. Empty the pieces into the bucket or carton. Stir with the sticks. Add the dye. Collect up small handfuls of mache and create a frame around your card. Sprinkle with glitter*?
2: Un/titled?: Does your final piece have a name? A hashtag?
3: Body mash-up gallery: once you’ve finished your beauty map why not photograph the piece. Hold an exhibition or create an online gallery on Instagram, Flickr or another image hosting website, so others can view and read them.
Extension activity
Find out more about how the beauty industry is trying to make-over the gender and sexual norms it has created over the years. How far does the beauty industry both work for and against normative ideals? Can the beauty industry advance social justice? Or is their promotion of inclusivity and justice just cosmetic? What new beauty norms are you seeing around you? Is the subversion of beauty ideals being commodified?
Why not create a soundtrack of uplifting body positive songs to accompany your body-mashing workshop?
Before you begin adapting these activities for the children and young people in your setting, read the section on Safety and Support.
* Anyone who has ever used glitter knows it gets everywhere. So why glitter? Glitter’s capacity to linger long after an activity has happened, can be its power! Every time you spot some glitter, it will connect you back to how you were getting creative with mashing-up normative body ideals.
Download this DIY activity here:
