Handmade Animal Heads Put Imagination on Display in Swampscott

Amelia Piepgras looks at a recycle bin piled with cardboard and imagines a kingdom.

And the 13-year-old Swampscott girl has the patience and skill to shape a kingdom — an animal kingdom — from the cardboard.

"I see something flat and see it in different shapes," said Amelia, speaking slowly and deliberately.

She was in a room off the lobby where her pieces are on display.

They are a ferret, a cat, an antelope, a buffalo, a gazelle and a moose. They are unadorned — plain brown cardboard — and made to be worn.

The exhibit sprang from a shark mask she made in October for her music class, which used it while singing the song Surfin USA.

She then decided to make animal masks her year-long project at school, Marblehead Community Charter Public School.

But, really, said her mom, Leah Piepgras, Amelia's mask-making roots go back to early childhood.

She has always collected stuff whether they be sticks in the yard or pieces of wire and made things from them.

At 2 she drew on butcher paper.

At 7 or so she folded paper towels into a sheep's head and embroidered its eyes.

Now at 13 she has made animal heads of cardboard and a glue gun.

All of them took hours to create — stripping cardboard ply, tearing pieces, fraying them, folding them, overlapping them.

Her buffalo head took about 24 hours. Her ferret, maybe 36 hours. 

Her cat mask has ear hair and whiskers.

Her ferret is a world of folds and layers. Something a dancer might wear in a ballet.

These masks have personality.

Ameila is following in her mom's footsteps. And her dad's.

Leah is an artist and Colin does technically inspired art work. Ameilia's brother, George, likes to take things apart.

All the family members have their spaces for art work at home.

Amelia's is a corner of the living room.

She speaks slowly but has a busy life.

Reads a book a day, on average. Plays violin. Has a black belt in Tae Kwon Do. Runs track. And enjoys time with her friends and eating paninis.

Looking ahead she wants to spend a year in Italy or France as an exchange student.

And she wants to work in fashion and design. Maybe as an artist in the fashion industry.

Maybe building on the skill taking shape in her cardboard masks.