Art Techniques to Try
If you're experiencing a creativity-block or just looking for something artsy but relatively easy to do, here are some art techniques that are worth your time.
Coffee Creativity: If you like the idea of creating art with your coffee and actually getting to drink it after you're finished Instagramming it, then Latte Art is for you. If not, you could try "painting with coffee" to create beautiful brown paintings on paper to store forever.
To paint with coffee dissolve some instant coffee/coffee powder in hot water. The idea is to make more than one shade of colour. For a light brown dilute your coffee but don't add too much water as this will seep through the paper. For darker shades, make thicker coffee and keep them in separate cups. For the actual painting, lightly sketch your picture with pencil first on paper that is slightly thick. Apply various shades of your coffee colour with a paintbrush, but wait for it to dry before adding more layers to avoid a watery mess. For extra effect, you could apply glue in some areas and scatter coffee powder over them.
Glass Painting: You can make any glass surface more colourful -window panes, plates, glasses or just regular pieces of glass.
Work out a shape/design. Draw it on a piece of paper and copy it onto the glass surface using a glass liner, black would look best. Wait for it to dry and fill in the shape with colours using glass paint. If you're using tube paints, use a pin to prick the opening every now and then to prevent bubbles. Add glitter to beautify it or paste beads/sequins over the paint using superglue.
You could paint text as labels for jars containing sugar or salt. You could also decorate a plain glass on the outside, and fill in the inside with melted candle wax and insert a wick before it solidifies– making a candle + holder, a perfect gift item.
Papier-mâché: If you want to make a creative, sculpture-like structure using low cost, recycled materials, try papier-mâché. First choose a structure, a blown up balloon or any cardboard figure, that you want to cover with the papier-mâché.
To make the papier-mâché or covering material, tear newspapers or brown paper bags into small strips. Prepare a mixture - 2 parts white glue and 1 part water- in a bowl. Dip the strips into the glue and cover the structure by laying each strip over the surface and smoothing it with your fingers/paintbrush. To create shapes on your structure, such as a nose for a face, scrunch the paper strips into the desired shape, place them on your structure and coat with the glue mixture. Repeat for at least three layers, once you're happy with the shape. Let it dry for a day then paint over it or decorate as you see fit.
A face/head made out of a balloon looks nice as a decoration piece. You could even make a large flower vase using a balloon, by cutting out an opening after your structure has dried.
Salma Mohammad Ali fears she is becoming a crazy cat lady and uses writing as a means to grasp on to sanity. Send her your views/hate/love at fb.com/salma.ali209