How to Make a Day of the Dead Diorama
Day of the Dead, or Dia de los Muertos, is a Mexican holiday on which family and friends come together to celebrate the lives of those who have died. Participants build small, private shrines to honor the dead; many people travel to the cemeteries where loved ones are buried to leave sugar skull cookies and flowers on the graves. If you are working on a Day of the Dead project, you can make a diorama to help aid your presentation.
Things You'll Need
- Shoe box
- White air-drying clay
- Acrylic paint in assorted colors
- Paintbrush
- Triangular paint sponge
- Miniature plastic tombstones
- Miniature flower bouquets
- Tacky glue
Instructions
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1
Find an empty shoe box. Discard the lid and place the shoe box on a table covered with old newspapers or brown paper bags; this will make cleaning up easier.
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2
Press the white air-drying clay into the bottom of the shoe box and smooth it out. You can leave some texture to represent the ground. Let the clay dry completely
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3
Dab green acrylic paint onto the triangular paint sponge and paint the clay green so that it becomes the grass in the cemetery. Allow the paint to dry before moving forward with the diorama.
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4
Apply tacky glue to the bottoms of the miniature tombstones and place them on the ground. You can line them up in rows or intersperse them. Let the glue set completely.
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5
Glue the miniature bouquets in front of the tombstones.
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6
Take some of the left over clay and sculpt it into small rounds and let them dry. Paint them with black acrylic paint. Once the black dries, paint small skulls on them. Glue the clay skull cookies next to the bouquets.
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