Applied
Makeup, paint and powders. 31 face guides on EveryFaceShape so far.
Applied features are painted or powdered on and washed off: kohl and kajal, thanaka paste, sindoor and kumkum, contour and highlight, the white oshiroi of geisha and Kabuki actors, and the painted faces of Kathakali and Peking opera. Some last an evening, some a day; many are renewed every morning as part of faith, beauty or work.
Daily and devotional
Kajal is applied to the eyes and thanaka to the cheeks every day by millions of people. The tilak and the tripundra of ash are applied after worship, and sindoor by many married Hindu women daily. Kumkum, made from turmeric and lime, is offered and shared at festivals. These marks are renewed daily and carry meaning by tradition.
Stage and festival
Stage makeup takes hours: Kathakali artists build the chutti frame and paint green, red and black faces; Kabuki actors paint their own kumadori; Peking opera performers paint lianpu designs. For the Day of the Dead, faces in Mexico are painted as calaveras. In the West, contour and highlight, borrowed from the stage, became everyday makeup in the 2010s.
Famous applied face guides
Further reading
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Photo credits on this page
The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.
- Kumadori: Unknown author, Public domain, source
- Sindoor: Masum-al-hasan, CC BY-SA 3.0, source
- Contouring: Tobias ToMar Maier, CC BY-SA 3.0, source
- Kohl: Camila Zanon., CC BY 2.0, source
- Oshiroi: Conveyor Belt Sushi, CC BY 2.0, source
- Thanaka: Garonzi Stefania, CC BY-SA 4.0, source