Pinoy Santa

Moonies or not, my Filipino (Pinoy) Santa's finished. I like his face, quite pleased with it in fact, so I don't want to waste all that effort despite the annoying moonies.

Here he is, all painted and dressed. He is my interpretation of a Filipino Santa so he is wearing the traditional formal wear barong (or the closest I can to a barong), over a canvas undershirt (not really your typical shirt material but it was what I had on hand) paired with a red, velvety, very much Santa-like pants. I remember when we had to perform traditional Southern Tagalog dances in school, the male costume is a usually a white shirt and a pair of red pants, so I thought the barong with the red pants would look good on him. The velvety part is a nod to the season.

Collar needs to be adjusted.

Bayong is a bit small for all his toy goodies!

Of course Santa needs a bag with goodies, so I gave him a bayong. Bayongs are bags made with woven palm leaves. Nowadays, there are a lot of fashionable bags and handbags made with the same or similar materials in an updated style. 

Filipino toys

His goodies are also traditional Philippine toys. First we have taka (paper mache) horse. These are usually colored bright red with black hair and colorful line drawings. It was quite a sight to see those during Christmas or town festivals -- tons of red horses all lined up!

Next we have the slingshot or in Filipino, tirador, the top or turumpo, toy guitar or gitara, clay pots or palayok and the sungka. The clay pot is also colored red with white designs on it like the taka horse. This is also typical of toy clay pots sold during Christmas and town festivals. You can buy them as miniatures and boy, were those fun! The pot is sitting on another clay creation, which acts as the stove. You put the coal directly under the pot.

I don't know the English translation for sungka, but it is played by two players. The bigger grooves at the end of the board is assigned to a player and it acts as their "home base". They collect their "subi" here, subi is the shell each player collects when they pass their home base. Each groove, minus the home bases, has six shells or pebbles in it. Both players start playing at the same time by choosing one groove from their side of the board, putting all the shells in it in their hand and then dropping one shell or pebble in the consecutive grooves after. They will also drop one pebble in their home base but of course, skipping the competition's. When you get to the last shell in your hand, you pick up all the shells or pebbles in the groove where you were supposed to drop it. The player who drops a shell in an empty hole loses his turn. He or she can only continue to play when the other player loses his or her turn in the same way. The player with the most pebbles in his or her home base wins. Ooh, I hope that description is accurate! It's been ages since I last played the game. I do wish to have another sungka, but I want the more intricate carved ones with feet stands.

Wow, all these brought back very fond memories of childhood. I wish I could go back soon to celebrate a town fiesta or Christmas in the Philippines.

Just for fun, I also gave Pinoy Santa a fake beard with elastic band.

Weekend project: Rag Doll

To take a break from a bad case of moonies (you can see my post here), I switched to a different medium over the weekend. I made a soft doll with hypoallergenic filling, a Christmas gift for my niece. 

My theme here is still Filipiana, so Pipay the rag doll, is wearing a bluegreen halter neck dress with a pink Filipiana bolero. The dress was adorned with shabby chic pink floral patches and her bolero has a matching brooch. 

I will try to make butterfly sleeves next time - that is, if I ever find my iron. I'm not decided yet if I want her to have full face but I do like the style of rag dolls with eyes on them and no other features. Any votes? 

However she turns out, I hope my niece likes Pipay! 

Filipiana art doll: Sisa

I had other plans but as inspirations go, this little gal just wanted to be made. I found my reference easily - person to model her face on, don't ask me who, just one of my friends. My dolls do not necessarily look like my references. I read before that it's always a good idea to have a reference so that's what I aim for when I work. I finished her quite quickly and it was a great learning experience.

I'll call her Sisa. Sisa in Philippine culture is almost always equated with a crazy woman. This is because a character by that name in Noli Me Tangere (Touch Me Not), a book written by the Philippine national hero Jose Rizal - spoiler alert - went crazy when her sons went missing.

So crazy long hair, Spanish era clothes, and I hereby dub thee Sisa. Sisa is different and a definite experiment. Firstly, she is smaller, about 9-10 inches tall. She is only semi posable, you can make her stand and sit but her arms do not bend. I'm also still experimenting with the fabric I find here for costuming.

Filipina hair usually flow straight and with the style back then when women wore panetas or combs, the middle part usually lies flat, so that's one thing I have to watch out for when putting hair on my dolls. Right now, with the way her hair is glued on, she has a very modern bounce at the top of her head.

The one thing I'm proud of here is her costume - it can be removed! I was able to make removable clothes and not all glued on like with most art dolls. So if I ever get the urge to make her new clothes, she will be like a regular doll you can dress up. And I do need to give her a new panuelo (the scarf on her shoulders), those polka dots are too big for her.

The biggest lesson for me here is if I want to be able to dress them up, I need to learn how to make clothes. I was barely able to figure out the relationship between the sleeves and the main part of the top for this doll. So I'm trying to learn as fast as I can.

In case you're interested, I have posted links to costume tutorials I found very helpful on my Pinterest board. I have tons of pins on sculpting too.

Alright, with Sisa all done - or almost done, I am craving to make a bigger doll. I might try 16 inches next. I'm like Goldilocks right now, trying to find which size fits me best. 

Filipiana Twins: Daylight pictorial

Did a quick shoot of the twins this morning to show their clothes and features better. Too bad I did not have any hair styling products with me to keep their stubborn hair strands in place. Let me know what you think of them. 

Part I: how the dolls started is here.
Part II: Hair, painting and costuming is here.

All dressed up and ready to go

Part II of the twins' adventure - my new dolls project (I started talking about them here).  This time they get paint, hair and clothes. I've already painted the face and spent hours putting on hair. Unfortunately, I forgot that I wanted the girl's hair in a bun so I used short strands of hair on her, which I later found was too short for a clean, sophisticated bun. Oh well. Both of their hairs were going wild after it was glued on, hubby kept saying they looked like witches (not helped by having my creepy Halloween bottles waiting to be painted in the background).

Excited to get my hair!

Hmm... I look adorable bald!

Rock and roll!

Headbangers! 

After the hair was done, I started with the girl's clothes first. I imagined it would take more time and I was right. It took a lot of tinkering and experimenting. I found a lovely gray cloth for the skirt. The design was small so it looked just right for a 13-inch doll.

Filipiana dresses can be really elaborate. A lot of them are beaded too. I started a Pinterest board to help me with Filipiana inspirations (click here to view my board). Luckily, there is a lot of photo references out there, both from modern and old sources. I love the beauty of traditional Filipino clothes. I had to make do with similar materials though since I have no access or budget for real materials like pina (pineapple) cloth or other elaborately embroidered materials.

I've collected some beads over the years, most from the Philippines and this was the perfect time to use them. I've never really beaded anything before and I only sew out of need. Luckily, sewing is pretty much like riding a bike, once I pedaled off, I found my running, back and blanket stitches coming back to me. The beading though was totally different -- it was hard and tedious. That's why I ended up with two different designs for the front and back of the skirt. If anybody asks, that's intentional.  

Experimenting with beads

Skirt first version

I found the top easy enough to make. Her white top is made from Ikea curtain scraps. Back in Dubai, the curtains I bought was too long so I cut it to size and sewed the bottoms back. The rest, I kept with my stash of fabrics that I keep for any future use. That was at a time that I did not have an inkling I will have an interest in doll making at all. Pays to be a pack rat sometimes. 

The skirt was patterned after the first easy long skirt pattern I found online. It had a short trail at the back. I snapped this picture above and was simply not happy with it. The waist was too low and the whole thing just didn't seem right. I left it for a day or two and then while reading a cosplayer's blog post about her Elsa costume, I realized I had to put another color in that skirt and it needs to have a flare! I searched for a material that will kind of match the gray cloth and found this two-toned pink striped fabric so I started cutting the original skirt to insert the pink in. Adding those pink strips, made it balloon more, which I thought suited the Filipiana look I was aiming for. 

Front of the skirt

Back of the skirt

I also found a lacy sort of fabric with tiny embroideries in pink! I remember when I was kid, they would spray water with starch in it before ironing shirts to make it nice and crisp. So I did the same with this fabric after I cut it to the size and shape I wanted. This was to be her panuelo or the scarf that goes over her shoulders. As final touches, I gave her slippers that matches her skirt and a pink rose on her hair.  

A rose on her hair

Traditional ones are embroidered I think. I made hers simpler.

I think I need a fan or an umbrella

I love her dainty panuelo!

The boy was easier. I gave him a shirt, pants and shoes. He is not as formal as the girl but this is the best I can do for now. His shirt is made from one of my Dad's old shirts, so even though his clothes were easier to make, his costume is definitely extra special. His final touch is a straw hat. I've learned a lot from this project so I'm definitely looking forward to my next. 

All dressed up

Check out my haircut

Ang Kambal

The Twins

More photos of the twins outdoors here. 

New Dolls and Yoga 2

My father passed away three months ago from lung cancer. It has been a very hard time. And it took a while before I could bring myself to work on any project. It's still hard, only last night I was dreaming he was in the hospital, diagnosed with something else and he was going to die in just a few minutes. He wanted to talk to a priest that he does not know personally, he's already spoken to his friend who's also a priest. I called my friend who knew a priest but his contact cannot be reached, I tried the priest at the hospital but he could not be disturbed because he was holding a service and I think I woke up sometime after that, running around looking for a priest before my father goes which was just a few minutes away.

When I finally found the will to open my boxed up clay, I could not find any inspiration. I did not know what I wanted to do. No spark. Nothing. At that point, I've been absent for a few months in all my social network sites as well. Since I could not find anything that interested me, I went back to Facebook and started looking at my feed to see what my family and friends have been up to.

One of my cousins regularly posts pictures of her fraternal twins, a boy and girl, and their antics, and that stirred up some creative interest. Those two are adorable. After a few days, the muses started humming, setting me on an ambitious note: two dolls at the same time, The Twins or in Filipino, Ang Kambal. 

Kinda funny how the start of dolls are always scary looking. Creating heads, hands and feet and curing them separately looks like a twisted factory but the end is so much fun and full of beauty. So here's the first look at The Twins:

Boy or girl?

Originally I wanted to make shoe-shaped feet but I changed my mind 

Hands waiting to be cured

Cured and "mummified" 

Adding feet and hands

These two are going to be a little older than my cousin's twins but they are, finally, going to be dressed in Filipiña. I've long wanted to create Filipiña dolls, and these two are going to be the start. More updates definitely coming soon. 

Which reminds me, I have not posted about my weekend at the Faerie Character Workshop taught by Wendy and Toby Froud yet. Now, that was super exciting. The doll I made during that workshop was a product of the vision quest by Wendy and my tribute to my Dad. I'm glad he was able to see that, he's always been very supportive of my art. These two dolls are based on what I learned on that workshop so I'll definitely be posting about that too.

Part two of finishing the twins: hair, painting and costuming are here.
Part three: outdoor photos are here.

Yoga Day 2

I am loving Adrienne! I just finished her Day two, 40-minute Yoga session (Day 1 is here) and I feel great. Even the strain on my right shoulder, which has been my constant companion for the last two weeks and has been slowly taking over my right side, seems to be responding well.

Yey to D2!

Client feedback & new dolls

Ugh. I've just been really slow at crossing off items in my to do list. The holidays lulled me into a very zombierriffic state. I did catch up with a tons of TV series I wanted to finish though, which is always good for the soul. ;)

Last month, my client sent a great big thumbs up, a feedback from his team, for the group caricature he ordered. Always tickled pink when client sends feedback. The team was from a very international background so I had fun playing with the setting with scenes from China, UAE and Japan to name a few. 

Year's starting slowly... hard to get back to routine after all the lovely food and late mornings. But one thing I did get back on to is my clay work. Here's a preview of one of my latest creations: Filipiana doll in the simple baro at saya (top and skirt). I'm still not done with her, still tons to do and learn, but this is the reason why I became interested in clay work in the first place. And I am quite happy with how she looks so far. Hope you like it!