Alesia’s Art Activities
Alesia Lacina has a long history of arts education in Grinnell. Here are some of her favorite art activities for you!
Character Map
Using the following categories as a guide, let the kids create a character. With the finished description, have the kids write a story based on the character or illustrate what they think this character looks like.
- Name
- Personality
- Favorite things
- Dislikes
- Family
- Friends
- Appearance/looks
- Whatever else you want to add!
Georgia O'Keeffe Flowers
The famous artist, Georgia O'Keeffe, is known best for painting huge flowers. Here's our O'Keeffe inspired paintings. Go ahead and give this fun project a try!
Materials
Large pieces of paper
Paint (any kind)
Paintbrushes
Big artificial flowers for examples/inspiration (optional)
Paint shirts
Instructions
Let the kids pick a flower they like and their colors. Mix new shades if necessary.
Paint! Encourage the kids to paint the entire canvas - the flower should be pretty large and have a background.
Recyclable Sculptures
Materials
Masking tape
Recyclables of any sort (ex: cardboard boxes and tubes, milk cartons and jugs, egg cartons, etc.)
Scissors and/or craft knife
Paint & brushes
Miscellaneous supplies
Instructions
Design your sculpture. Pick out the pieces to be used and arrange them best you can. For smaller details, like snouts, use scissors or a craft knife to cut items to your liking . See Tips below for ideas on what items work well for a specific purpose.
Using the masking tape, firmly secure the tubes and other parts to the body. Tightly tape all the way around the sculpture. It may not look pretty, but the tape keeps the sculpture from falling apart. There is no such thing as too much tape in this project.
Paint the sculptures. Let dry.
Add decorations like googly eyes, pom-poms, or whatever you have lying around.
Tips
- Toilet paper and paper towel tubes work best for legs, arms, and necks.
- Several of the sculptures worked well when they used a vertical cardboard box for the chest and a horizontal box beneath to make it sit up.
- Cut off the neck of a water bottle or pop bottle to make a nice snout.
- Egg cartons are great for making ears in several styles.
- Depending on how many sculptures you are making, you may need multiple rolls of masking tape.
Some kids put tape tubes together so they acted as joints.
Starry Night Paintings & Dioramas
These cool paintings are inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's famous painting, The Starry Night.
Materials
Canvas
Black acrylic paint
Rubbing alcohol (91% isopropyl)
Paint brushes
Glow-in-the-Dark duct tape
Glow-in-the-Dark paint
Paintbrushes
Miscellaneous materials
Glue
Spray bottle
Cardboard box
Instructions
Water down the black paint to a thin consistency.
Cover the canvas with the paint very quickly.
Use the spray bottle to dribble/spray some drops of the rubbing alcohol over the wet black paint. Watch as the paint and alcohol mix
Paint the inside of the box black.
Let the canvas and box dry overnight.
Trim the canvas if necessary and tape or glue to the back of the box to create a background.
Use the glow in the dark paint and duct tape to create a starry scene. With other materials, add other objects to the scene---just remember that they won't glow.
Take the diorama into a dark place to see the scene glow.
Tips
Test out the project several times to make sure that the alcohol will react correctly. It can be tricky.
For another project, create just the canvas as the cover for a book about constellations.
Clay Eggs
Materials
Large slabs of clay
Inflated balloons
Paper plates
Acrylic paint
Paintbrushes
Instructions
Cover balloon with reasonably thin slabs of clay (they must be long enough that they meet around the balloon). Make sure to leave a small hole at the top, large enough to pull the once-popped balloon out.
Pinch or slightly smooth out the edges. There shouldn’t be any holes but these are not meant to look pretty or perfect.
Let the eggs dry on paper plates for a couple of days, pop the balloons and let dry for a few more weeks.
Decorate with paint. For example, some kids painted theirs like dragon eggs.
Tips
There’s a fine line between too little clay that will not hold up its weight when the balloon is popped and too much clay which will collapse on itself. Use your best judgement and good luck.