Master's Thesis












Thesis Statement
My Wig and Makeup Master’s Thesis required me to design a fully realized production: The Rover as well as three theoretical shows of my choosing with one set in the past: Hedwig and the Angry Inch; one in the present: Tipping the Velvet; and one in a future or fantasy world: Frankenstein. Within each show, I’ve designed and rendered nine characters/looks and fully realized three characters from each of the three stories. When I sat down and thought about the three stories I wanted to theoretically design, I knew I wanted to document the ways in which queer people perform their gender through their appearance. One of my major goals was to design with the essence of each of my models in mind and fuse their unique identities with my own creative vision. In doing so, these applications had a particularly transformative magic. In taking my designs from rendering to reality, we brought to life the freedom that comes from queerness, specifically in relation to the metamorphoses that can be found through wigs and makeup. I completed five custom wigs that I constructed using various methods and then styled to my design, an additional wig that I styled, three custom prosthetics, custom tattoo transfers, a hand crafted marionette, custom costume pieces, and an article I wrote regarding the care of our bodies as wig and makeup artists.