The Minotaur Project

According to ancient Cretan tradition, there was a bull-headed monster living in a labyrinth. Theseus heroically slew this monster and the rest of the story is, well, legend. The Minotaur was generally described as a human male with a bull's head, but he has subsequently been represented as also having bovine rear legs and tail too.

So with this in mind, I set about creating a Minotaur head for use either with or without my cloven hooves.

My first port of call was Google SketchUp. I found a reasonable 3D minotaur model and another model of a human male, and I combined them to produce several views of what I wanted the finished product to look like. I wanted it to look reasonably in proportion. 

A basic problem is the eyes: bovine eyes are very high on the skull, and it's actually quite difficult to place them in a likely position and for it still to be possible to look through the same holes.

For my next trick, I gutted an old construction hard hat and glued the inner frame - the bit that sits on my head - to some cardboard shapes. And I wanted the jaw to articulate, so I looked at bovine anatomy on the internet and learned that the jawbone actually hinges to the skull just behind the eye socket.

Articulating jaw.

The head begins to take shape.

I found some long cardboard tube and cut it up to make the formers for the bull's horns.

Horns 2.

Horns 1

Now papier mache. Despite the mix of Elmer's Glue-All and water being washable with water, I learned last time that it makes one helluva mess. This time round, I did the work on the kitchen draining board, which controlled the extent of mess and made cleanup a lot easier.

Papier mache complete.

Papier mache mess.

And then I got out the hot glue gun and the Karrimat, and made a smoother surface that would eventually be covered with fur.

The horns were covered with several layers of air-dry clay, each layer being sanded down and filled until the horns were a satisfactorily smooth shape. Then I painted them with acrylics and varnished them with Elmer's, which should help to control any clay cracking and make the horns more durable.

Foam and clay.

Finally, I started with paint and fur. It isn't perfect yet, but here's the product so far. It's almost impossible to see out of and, disappointingly, I can't get the jaw to articulate. When I try, the whole mask droops forward and if I want to open the mouth I have to hold the back of the head down.

"Anyone seen my labyrinth?"