Chalk Pastel Sunflowers

So this is a pastel project using a glue resist method I've seen several times.Most notably I've seen Kathy over at "Art Projects for Kids" use this many times.   I wanted to test the boundaries of this technique so I did a few experiments.























MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- chalk pastels, you can also try regular chalk, (results will vary, see below)
- black paper (cardstock, construction, tinted sketch)
- regular school white glue
- kleenex tissue
- pencil and eraser

Trace out your design in pencil.  I wanted to use odd cuts of paper for visual interest.

-Open(cropped) composition.

Now take your regular school glue or tacky glue and go over your outline.  Make sure you work on a flat surface.

I'm working on top of wax paper as my lines go off the page.


Let dry flat.

When dry you can snip off any little ends from the glue that go past the page.

Using the pastel add color in the sections marked off by the color and smudge.  Keep a tissue handy to wipe your fingers off.

Now I found the best way to approach this is to add color in small sections.  You can discuss with the kids the use of more than one color for each section as we have highlights and shading.

But when smudging I found it best to start with the lightest color first and then smudge into the dark.  This helps to keep those light colors from getting lost.  Wipe off fingers and then go to next part.  (for example I would smudge one petal, wipe, and then smudge the next).

Now I know not everyone has access to chalk pastels so I wanted to see how regular colored chalk would work.

This is done with chalk pastels.

and this is done with regular colored chalk.  We have fewer colors to work with and we don't have that richness in the colors but still do-able.

I tried this technique with oil pastels but found the glue sections very hard to smudge.  I could foresee lots of frustration and ripped papers for the kids so I recommend this only for chalk pastels.

Housekeeping:  Some of you may have noticed I added pictures for all the posts listed on my page directories at the top.  Seasonal is getting way to big so I am creating pages for each season.  I hope this will be more user friendly for you all.

 See you next time.