While at the Art Academy of Cincinnati all seniors are meant to complete a thesis show. We must come up with the concepts, goals and even setting up in a gallery space without given constrains. 

I wanted to try and use as many of my skills as possible in my project rather than focusing on only one aspect of what I can do. After brainstorming for a period of time I decided to create a collection of dolls and the branding
associated with them. I’ve seen people make similar custom dolls and with my own background in sewing I thought it would allow me to showcase skills while learning and problem solving.

Process

The dolls are factory Ever After High Dolls, I chose these because they come in a variety of heights and skin tones. To make them appear less “standard” I shrunk the doll heads in acetone to shrink them and added clay to all of they’re bodies to mimic different culture standard of beauty. I also sanded and removed all of the seams and addition plastic detailing. I created patterns, clothing, accessories, and even wigs for each doll. The wigs are made by hand from yarn, and the faces are created using pastel and water color pencils.

Each doll is based on a different mythological goddess who in some way is related to the night sky. I tried to create a variety of concepts and focused heavily in research of the myths and cultures to understand how the people of the time viewed and worshiped these goddesses. Additionally to the culture research I also looked deeply into the history of dolls, figures, the collectible toy market and packaging for these types of artifacts.