"Gurning" explained at Worldwidewords.org, where English is explained "from a British standpoint..."
This British term... applied to the pulling of faces as a competitive activity. A surviving example is that in the Lake District, where the Egremont Crab-Apple Fair has an annual contest, which they call the World Championship Gurning Competition and which they say dates back to 1266...
The rules at Egremont are simple: competitors put their heads through a horse collar and then have a set time in which to contort their faces into the most gruesome, scary or daft expressions possible. False teeth may be left in or taken out, or even turned upside down if desired...
The word seems to have been originally Scottish, in the form girn, which — appropriately enough — may have been a contorted form of grin. It has had several meanings, of which the oldest — from medieval times — is still current in Scots and Irish dialect, and which is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as: “to show the teeth in rage, pain, disappointment, etc; to snarl as a dog; to complain persistently; to be fretful or peevish..."
Wikipedia adds: "In Australia the most common form of gurning is the "duck face", with many areas holding local annual competitions for this form of facial expression. The "duck face" has been brought into mainstream culture by such people as TV's Kath and Kim, and is characterised by pursed lips and raised eyebrows."I think there's some movie (?cartoon movie) where a character sticks his head through something and wins a prize. ?Shrek?
And I suppose it must be just a coincidence that the presentation resembles that of a baby's face presenting at childbirth...
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