Trust the Process

One of the most fun parts of art can be the process (the actions and steps used when working with art materials) and experimenting with materials.  Simply put, art can be fun to make.  

The artistic behavior or studio habit of experimenting, discovering new materials and ways of working with materials is to EXPLORE.

Let's look at a few ways you might EXPLORE in the art studio.

Grab a messy mat and see what happens when you add a few drops of paint to your paper and pull/scrape the paint across your paper with a square of cardboard.

A few dots of color can go a long way!  Just a dot not a lot!

Instead of a brush, scrape and pull paint across the paper.  Draw or collage on the colorful paper the next class.  


Sometimes a material we typically throw away can create some very cool art.  Try the process of bubble wrap printing.  Choose colorful tempera paint and brush it across the "bumpy" side of the bubble wrap.  Press onto your paper.  Repeat!

So you have some dotted paper, now what?  Next class, make a collage with your dotted paper or draw on top.

This one definitely requires a placemat!  Liquid watercolors have bright bold colors.    Start with 10 squirts of paint.  After 10, get permission for more.

Try a TAPE or Oil Pastel RESIST.*Let paint dry before removing tape.

Lay leaves or flowers on your paper and spray a fine mist.  Let your paint dry before removing the leaves.

Take that colorful misted paper over to drawing.  Create a Silhouette.  Draw an outline in pencil and then fill in your drawing with Sharpie.  A landscape is a great possibility for a silhouette.

Take your colorful sprayed paper to the collage studio and cut it into shapes and glue them into a picture you have envisioned.

Add Paint with Kwik Stix and glue down construction paper shapes.

Splatter paint is a permission only painting technique.  You will need a box that fits your paper and a messy mat for sure!

Try starting in the drawing studio and splatter painting onto a drawing.

Will you explore with art materials?

Will you stretch yourself and try to make art with your exploration?

*There is a difference between exploring and being wasteful!

Finding the RAINBOW in art

This mini lesson is total eye candy.  Sit back and enjoy basking in the glow of the RAINBOW.

Let's look at the RAINBOW in art!

Yayoi Kusama: Life Is the Heart of a Rainbow

Starting with Glass artist Dale Chihuly who along with his glass blowing team of artists spins RAINBOW colored glass into multi-color glass works of art
A boat filled with spheres of color or a twisted glass chandelier

Rainbows of thousands of shredded paper strips create this art by Travis Rice.

Sol Lewitt was an American artist whose color filled spaces might stop you in your tracks

Stripes of color carefully drawn and painted on a wall

A RAINBOW of Sol Lewitt's colors may greet you as you enter a New York City subway station.  A burst of color in a typically gloomy underground.

An Alabama community of quilters has transformed Colorful bed coverings into works of art.
A group of Gee's Bend quilters create a RAINBOW in stitched scraps of fabric to make these colorful quilts.In Taiwan an entire village is covered in a spectrum of colors

The buildings in this Taiwan village become works of art right down to the ground.

Why would an artist fill the walls of a building with color?

Well, over 10 years ago, the village where a then-86-year-old Huang Yung-fu lived faced being knocked down.  He did not want to leave the only home he had known in Taiwan.  Painting his village made people want to visit this location and residents to stay

Gabriel Dawes brings us RAINBOW art that is hanging by a thread

Strand by RAINBOW strand 

Literally miles of threads create RAINBOW installations 

Across a space, back and forth, slow and steady Gabriel strings delicate threads between secured hooks

A peak inside the process of Gabriel Dawes

Almas Thomas was a retired school teacher and artist. You made art in her style in Kindergarten

Alma would look out her window panes and see specks of color from the flowers in her backyard garden.  

She wanted her paintings to look like the rainbow she would view out her window. Dashes of color mimmic the squares of glass in a window.

A group of artists painted their art with intense and saturated colors that we don't typically see in nature.

Because of the colors these artists used, they were called the Fauves --which in French translates to Wild Beast.  People were not used to brightly colored art at this time.  It was unusual.  Sometimes people might not be kind when they don't understand or see something new.  How do you respond to things you aren't used to.  

Fauvism was a style of painting in the early 1900s (over 100 years ago) that emphasized bright, expressive color

Maurice Vlaminck, Bougival, 1905,

In this LANDSCAPE Do you see PINK, Blue, Read and Teal t

small towns and landscapes with intense color, thick paint, very similar to van Gogh’s style.

Color by number!  Artist Emmanuelle Moureaux used brightly colored paper to create a interactive paper installation titled Forest of Numbers

Our St. Louis Art Museum has several colorful works of art

Art by Elsworth Kelly and Frank Stella are a great place to start on your St. Louis Art Museum Rainbow hunt

The Shape of Abstraction by Stanley Whitney is another great stop on the search for color packed art at the SLAM.

Do you respond to color in art?  

Will you use more than one color in your art?

What are some of the colors that can make you feel emotions when you look at art?

Jen Stark Chromatic Cascade