This week we have enjoyed a really brilliant art and sculpture project learning all about taotie motifs! A taotie is a gluttonous creature in Chinese mythology, which is always hungry no matter how much it eats. Its name translates to ‘legendary voracious beast’. Images of taotie appear on ancient Chinese bronze artefacts, such as masks and ritual vessels called dings.

To begin with, we looked at images of taotie designs used on items from the Shang Dynasty. It was great to see real life evidence of the bronze working we studied a few weeks ago! We sketched some beautiful taotie images in our books to really understand the symmetry, patterns and techniques used.

After that, we learnt about the casting techniques the Shang people used to create these taotie motifs. We recreated this method ourselves using a selection of mold casting techniques in class!

Out of paper, silicone and clay, we decided silicone gave the clearest pattern. However, to mimic the closest method to the Shang people we could, we then used clay to make our own molds and designed our own taotie motif!

Have a look and see for yourselves! They are absolutely brilliant Year 5, well done on using such resourceful learning to create these great designs.