After conservators spent years reattaching ears, re-applying lipstick (or lipstick-colored oil paint) and, at least in Carmen Miranda's case, flocking a fragile fruit and flower headdress, one of the odder collections in the Nebraska State Historical Society's possession is restored and ready for its close-up.
The exhibit, “The Strange and Wonderful Masks of Doane Powell, Part Two,†opens Friday at the Nebraska History Museum, 131 Centennial Mall North.Â
The second set of masks on display includes caricatures of leaders both celebrated and reviled at the time that Powell, who died in 1951 at age 69, made them. Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Winston Churchill are joined by Mussolini and Hitler, and the collection also features famous faces from the first half of the 20th century — W.C. Fields, Joan Crawford, Mae West, Will Rogers.
On each of the masks, the familiar features of the faces depicted are exaggerated to a degree that borders on cartoonish, which, given Powell’s pre-mask-making gig as an editorial cartoonist for the Omaha Bee, should not come as a surprise.
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“They have a certain vibe to them,†said Ann Billesbach, director of the Nebraska History Museum.
The collection was donated to the historical society by a relative of Powell's apprentice, and none of the 69 masks were in pristine condition after decades in storage and years of frequent use.Â
The masks Powell made after moving to New York were worn by performers in circus acts, theatrical productions and on TV, where guest celebrities hid their identities behind them on “Masquerade Party†while a panel of other celebrities tried to figure out who was under there.
The show first aired in 1952, a year after Powell could see any of his creations featured on it. But before his death, Powell produced a manual that showed others how he made them. It would help the staff at the Gerald R. Ford Conservation Center in Omaha preserve them more than half a century later.
In “Masks and How to Make Them,â€Â Powell discusses everything from the value of exaggeration to his preferred paint mixtures for skin tones to the disdain he had for making animal masks that people then wore. (Unrealistic eye hole placement really bothered him.)
Conservator Rebecca Cashman said that, for the restoration team, the book served as a rare blueprint, offering a step-by-step guide to how Powell made caricatures that were eerily lifelike.
“It was interesting as a conservator to read this book, because he made decisions on what would last longest,†said Cashman, who is giving a presentation on the restoration effort at the museum at 5:30 p.m. Friday. “I think he was just obsessed with capturing the essence of whatever person he was trying to make a mask of.â€Â
Her talk will include a start-to-finish account of working on masks that were in the worst states of disrepair.Â
“Definitely the Hitler mask took a long time,†Cashman said. “That one had been handled a lot. His head was crumpled, the left side of his face was dented in. There was an ear laying next to him that belonged to him.â€
Billesbach said that, rather than turn a blind eye to history, the museum staff chose to put much of the collection on display, which will run through July 7.
Vonnda Shaw, senior conservation technician, said that she was focused on the detailed restoration work, rather than the face of whomever she happened to be repairing. Learning a little trivia about slightly lesser-known figures such as Wendell Willkie was a bonus, she said. So was fixing the face of Elsie, the Borden Dairy Co. cow.Â
Continuing in that tradition of working on cartoonish likenesses, the conservators’ latest undertaking is restoring as best they can the 28 puppets from the KOLN/KGIN-TV show, “Kalamity Kate’s Cartoon Corral.â€