Got Cardboard?

Recycled Cardboard Art Projects

If you're like me, you have some leftover cardboard boxes from the holidays, courtesy of Amazon. 

(I asked my friend who works for UPS, if they are bitter about Amazon Prime and the onslaught of deliveries they bring, not to mention the 2-day delivery guarantee. He just smiled politely.) 😉

I love coming up with ideas to utilize this humble material. I think it makes a great canvas for a variety of projects. And there is something so satisying about creating "something" from "nothing". Once cut out with an X-acto knife, this tropical fish was created using some craft acrylics and magazine pages with a 2 inch circle punch for colorful scales. I raided my craft closet and used various materials to add some extra punch: puff, paint, sequins and glue combined with black paint for outlining. You could use whatever you have on hand. I glued some twine to the back so it could be hung. This would be a great project to do with the kids over the rest of your winter break.

More Cardboard Creative Fun!

Click on the links below for the original posts

1.) Butterflies

2.) Kimmy Cantrell and Eric Straw Inspired Masks

3.) Abstract Masks

4.) Recycled Cardboard Birds

Canada Geese

For some reason, winter art lessons tend to be my favorites. And throw in a bird subject matter and I'm really in my happy place. These Canada Geese (not Canadian Geese as I have come to learn) were created on 12 x 18 black construction paper using chalk pastels. My students always ask me if they are allowed to add hats, bows or other various accessories to their animal creations. Well it is the giving season, go ahead kids!  For the backgrounds, I gave a limited palette of acrylics to dry brush on to their pieces of roofing felt from dark to light. A splattering of snowfall was added before gluing their cut geese. (1st through 4th grade artists.) *Update: Be sure to use Natural roofing felt, Not synthetic, which can contain fiber glass. 

Fall Art Sampling

 Matisse inspired Apples - Andie, 1st grade

 Process Art pieces with lots of media play -1st - 3rd grade

 Inspired by Picasso's "Sylvette" sculpture - 1st graders

 Acrylic on Natural roofing felt - Inspired by Georgia O'Keeffe - 1st grade

Mixed media with weaving - Maddie, 5th grade

Grumpy Cats on Color Fields - 1st - 4th grade

Here are some of the projects my students have created over the past couple months. I have enjoyed visiting some old favorites, as well as incorporating some new projects ideas. I have made an effort to focus on media play and process based art fun. Up next, Winter Wonderland Art Fun. Perfect for our SoCal temps!

Revisiting Monet's Bridge

Reese - Kinder

 Emerson - 2nd

 Alexa - 3rd

 Blake - 1st

 Gwendolyn - 3rd

Charlee - 1st

Why is it life has a strange way of coinciding with the art lessons I'm undertaking? (Perhaps my subconscious is leading me) Last Wednesday, while teaching my young students about the art of Claude Monet and showing them how he painted the same bridge many times, even as he went blind, my husband was battling blindness as well. He is facing vision loss issues from glaucoma and cataracts (as Monet). I used it as a teachable moment, with a positive spin as our modern ocular technologies have improved greatly. (He just underwent his third surgery, and we are very encouraged.)

I have done this project a couple times, but I really enjoyed the textured effect of salt this time. The first step in creating these was using the wet on wet technique with liquid watercolor and salt. I offered yellow, green, turquoise and blue. The children created a light horizon line in the middle of their paper. I allowed them to use whichever combination of these colors for their sky and pond. After the backgrounds were dry they created leaves, plants, and lillies with acrylic paint and small brushes. To add depth to their plants I had them paint from darkest to light, with no rinsing of brushes. I offered pre-cut bridges for them to paint as they chose. And of course, cut photos in the middle of their bridges, were the perfect finishing touch. What a sweet gift for a parent (Mother's Day) or grandparent these would make!

African Inspired Masks with Metal Tooling

For our last project in my summer class Unique Materials Art Fun we created these metal tooled masks on painted Natural roofing felt. Update: Be sure to use Natural roofing felt, Not synthetic, which can contain fiber glass. The above masks were created by 1st-3rd graders. Miss Mary cut the metal masks out and hot glued them to their painted backgrounds. Given that there are some sharp edges, I told parents these were strictly for decoration. Crisis averted. 😉

Created by my cool trio of 5th grade boys.

Playing with Hearts

This project was all about playing with media and experimenting with different techniques.

Here's the list:

Watercolor and salt

Watercolor and rubbing alcohol

Crumpled paper with watercolor

Watercolor painted old book pages

Acrylic scraped paint

Sharpie colored transparencies

Bubble wrap prints

Oil pastel and watercolor concentric hearts with puff paint

Oil pastel blended with baby oil

Chalk pastel on black paper

Recycled painted paper and magazine pages

Phew! I think that covers it. After all hearts were created, dry and cut out, the kids could play around with which combination and layout looked most pleasing to them. And then - commence the gluing. Needless to say this was loads of fun for my whole group of Unique Art Materials students. 

(1st-4th grade)

Summer Art Fun

Sharpie Line Portraits with Bleeding Tissue Paper

 Piers in 1 point perspective with creature "selfies"

my experiment

Mixed Media Orca Collages

Well, the award for the biggest slacker in art teacher blogging goes to........yup, that would be me. Is there anyone out there anymore? I didn't mean to stay away for so long. I have been doing some posting on Facebook and Instagram. My Generation X self is still grappling with so much social media I suppose. I know....excuses, excuses. 😀

This summer I have 3 different themed art classes. June: Draw, Paint, Clay Collage, July: Animals and Birds, and August: Unique Material Art Lab. This month has been all about playing with different media. I like to inject an extra sense of play in my summer classes. I find the kids really appreciate the encouragment to just explore and play with media and not worry about the end product. I suppose I may be speaking to my own inner artist as well. 

Earth Day Peacock Collages

my experiment

I recently had the opportunity to lead two Girl Scout troops and a Daisy troop in an Earth Day inspired art project. Oh what fun! It takes me back to my days in troop 178 in Pasadena, California. "Make new friends but keep the old, one is silver and the other's gold." A good rule to live by.

My sweet group of 1st grade Daisies created owl collages using grocery bags and magazine pages along with oil pastels for extra details. Each girl got up and shared more about their owl after our creations were complete. When I asked the group about the 3 "R's" (reduce, reuse, recycle) for helping our environment, I was informed there is a 4th, "rot" (as in composting). Schooled by a 6 year old. 😉

my experiment

My two groups of 3rd-5th graders created peacock collages using the same recycled materials. Chalk pastels were used to add color to our grocery bag peacock bodies as well as the black construction paper backgrounds. There was a distinct haze of chalk dust in the air. I encouraged the girls to find just 3 magazine pages with interesting colors, patterns or textures and cut out small medium and large raindrop or oval shapes to create our feather eyes. Of course, there were too many beautiful pages to pass up, so they bartered and shared. This was a fun project and I was thrilled to see the girls go in their own direction in creating their collages.