Body parts

A few weeks ago we did a really nice kid art atelier I thought I’d share.

Here’s the supplies list:
Kraft paper , butchers paper, or any extra large sheets of paper you can find
brown or black acrylic paint + a few bright colors
Permanent marker

The spirit of the atelier was the painter Joan Miró, bright colors and overlapped images. The kids laid down on the floor and traced each other’s body outlines with a sharpie. You have to use big enough paper for them to fit inside and you have to encourage them to try to squish themselves in the frame of the paper while getting them to make a nice shape. It’s good to do a little practice session beforehand and talk about what nice shapes they can make—what looks good etc.



Each child then takes their own image and paints it in various bright colors which you can get them to mix. We usually encourage the kids to mix their own colors in the ateliers and it’s starting to pay off. Sometimes they’ll say things now like “hey look at my blue isn’t it pretty?” We originally started with just getting them to add at least a squirt of white or black to play with the tones but now they can pretty much mix their own colors from the primaries which I think is a really useful tool in life. Some kids resist mixing and some love it. I'd say don't push it and just let them have fun.



Finally when the paint is dry ask them to outline their image again with brown or black paint to make it bolder because the original marker drawing will be a little faded out.. It looks a bit like a police body outline when they’re finished, kind of creepy but fascinating.






If you like them you can mod podge them onto a hard surface, --wood or canvas works. You can overlap two or more of the the images to create a fabulous art piece of multiple kids images. My neighbor liked hers so much she’s framing it for her living room. They were pretty cool with both her kids overlapped, kind of like a moment frozen in time but maybe not as cheesy as plaster hand prints.



I still have to mount ours but first I have to get Little S to trace Charlotte because she was napping during the atelier.