MetaChat - Dioramas

MetaChat is an informal place for MeFites to touch base and post, discuss and chatter about topics that may not belong on MetaFilter. Questions? Check the FAQ. Please note: This is important.

13 April 2011

Dioramas Did you have to make dioramas in school? What were they of?→[More:]We had to do dioramas for our New Jersey State History project in 3rd or 4th grade. I made a diorama of the state bird, the goldfinch. It was nestled in a pine tree (real branch) with a construction-paper background of sky and additional branches. The goldfinch itself, of which I was very proud, was made of salt-clay dough dyed yellow. I added black highlights for feather tips, eyes, and beak with ink and brush. After whatever event we displayed these masterpieces at, my diorama lived on my dresser for several years. I admit that, on occasion, I would occasionally pick up the salt clay goldfinch and surreptitiously lick the base of it...for the salt. Like a deer. It lasted a long time, until one day it got knocked off my dresser and broke apart. The pieces were brittle, like crumbled plaster, and unrepairable. Goodbye, goldfinch diorama.

post by: Miko at: 23:15 | 26 comments

All I remember is glue and shoeboxes.

posted by mudpuppie 13 April | 23:19

I am still irritated by the time my friends and I all pitched in to ~~help~~ make my daughter's 6th grade diorama for a book called Slake's Limbo. We all had fine arts degrees and were practicing artists of one kind or another and that afternoon we Really. Got. Into. That. Diorama. It had three levels depicting the NY subways and a bunch of sculpy homeless people and tiny posters and even minuscule rats on the subway tracks. We got a C. So much for BFAs in action. I got an A on her Harriet Tubman paper that year, though. ;-)

posted by mygothlaundry 13 April | 23:31

I made one in 4th grade for the Wanda Gag translation of the Grimm's "Cat and Mouse Keep House". Another kid made the Emerald City.

posted by brujita 14 April | 00:12

I stretched the Golden Gate bridge from the earth to the moon.

posted by Ardiril 14 April | 02:43

We had a diorama party at our house a few years ago. The only thing that remains from it (as far as I am aware) is one made of me, my wife and son. It sits on my piano and I'll take a picture of it later if I get a chance.

posted by Obscure Reference 14 April | 07:10

I love the idea of a diorama party.

posted by Miko 14 April | 07:48

I made one for Island of the Blue Dolphins and one for the Nutcracker I think.
The best was in high school when we read the bible and had to respond to it artistically and my friend and I made a gingerbread Noah's Ark.

posted by rmless2 14 April | 08:17

Holy shit, rmless, I made one from a Island of the Blue Dolphins as well! That was one of my favorite books as a child.

Plus, a diorama party sounds like a really fun time.

posted by msali 14 April | 08:23

My friend Elizabeth and I made one of the Battle of Fort Darling.

posted by JanetLand 14 April | 08:50

In second grade, I made a diorama of our base on the moon. The moon base was a large marble painted silver embedded in modeling dough made from salt and flour.

I'm still waiting for that moon base in real life.

posted by warbaby 14 April | 08:52

I keep joking about having a diorama party, but never actually have. Maybe for next year's Peeps Show...

I recall making one of those salt clay volcanos with plastic dinosaurs around it, but don't actually remember any shoebox dioramas.

posted by JoanArkham 14 April | 09:18

MGL, you were robbed!

I cannot remember my dioramas, though I know I did them. My little one just did one with a ocean theme with dolphins and white clouds. It was cute.

posted by LoriFLA 14 April | 10:42

I would totally go to a diorama party, with or without Peeps.

I helped my son make a diorama of a beaver pond. It's harder than you'd think to find magazine images of clouds, but trees were easy. A little saran wrap to make the pond shiny, lots of twigs, it was really good. I think it's in his Memory Box. What a pleasant memory to revisit.

posted by theora55 14 April | 10:50

I remember doing one about Eskimos. I had these little plastic cavemen toys (like the green army men) and my mom helped me cover them in fur to make them look like they were wearing coats. I think the fur came from an old stole or something. I also made an igloo out of sugar cubes and covered the whole thing in white glitter and fake snow from the craft store.

I think I made one with a couple of friends after we had graduated from high school, but I have no idea what I made.

Maybe I'll make one this weekend - the boyfriend just bought some shoes so I've got a fresh shoe box!

posted by youngergirl44 14 April | 10:54

Bonus: As an adult, I don't need anyone to help you with the hot glue gun! I can use it all on my own!

posted by youngergirl44 14 April | 10:55

Pre-packaged "Star Wars" characters, still in their display box.

What's a diorama?

posted by Atom Eyes 14 April | 12:38

It's a miniature model of something. In this context, I'd say they're made by school children inside of boxes as class projects. I've also heard of life sized displays at museums called dioramas, but that negates the miniature part of the definition. Some examples of the shoe box variety.

posted by youngergirl44 14 April | 13:02

My dad made my sister this cool dinosaur scene for science fair.

He started with a plywood sign board, made the land out of plaster of Paris, and a couple lakes out of old mirrors. To which he added trees and the plastic dinosaurs that you still see today.

My sister won the science fair, and as happened with surfboards, bikes, school books, and even some clothes, it was handed down to me when my science fair time came.

posted by danf 14 April | 13:14

Until I saw The Simpsons I'd never heard of a diorama.

posted by Senyar 14 April | 13:28

I remember making a couple as a kid, but can't remember what they were. Bummer.

posted by deborah 14 April | 13:34

The life size diorama cases are really the first dioramas. I'm actually reading about them for my museum studies class right now. The formal definition is a three-dimensional model that represents a complete scene, but the model can be at any scale - even huge!

posted by Miko 14 April | 14:01

Dioramas where I work.

posted by JanetLand 14 April | 14:09

Mission San Buenaventura, out of Legos. In a shoebox.

posted by mdonley 14 April | 16:59

They all ended with me in tears, unable to execute my exciting and epic head-visions with my clumsy hands.

posted by rainbaby 14 April | 17:02

My diorama was of Kodiak, AK after the tsunami of the 1964 earthquake. It was awesome. I remember only using one corner of the box so I had a wider viewing area, cotton clouds hanging from twine, boats and popsickle-stick buldigs and green trees strewn everywhere.

In retrospect, it looked nothing like the aftermath of the Japan tsunami.

posted by rhapsodie 14 April | 23:05

I have a vivid memory of my mom helping me make a clay turtle for a " desert" biome diorama I had to make. I think we kept it in the dining room for a month after.

posted by The Whelk 15 April | 23:55

← Happy birthday to BitterOldPunk! || If you want to be on my mailing list, →

HOME || REGISTER || LOGIN