Wednesday 12 April 2017

Stencilling with Children

I quite like using stencils, especially with spray paint.  I makes me think of the amazing stencilled street art done by talented folks such as Banksy.  

Stencilling on skateboards is also a favourite workshop of mine.  We watch these great YouTube videos of talented artists producing stencils and spray painting them on skateboards.  I've started collecting quite a few stencils over the years and each time we do a stencil lesson I usually cut a few more of my own.  I sometimes let the older kids have a go and make their own if they want yet quite frankly I find stencil cutting hard work and I would rather they concentrated on the fun stuff.

In this lesson we used stencils on wood boards.  I just go to Bunnings (Aussie hardware store) and get them to cut a big sheet of MDF into smaller bits for me.  These boards are great for any projects that require something thicker than paper and are tonnes cheaper than using canvas.

I had children aged 5 to 12 produce these.

Scroll down for some other options and variations if you don't want to use spray paint.

What you need:
  • Wood boards
  • Spray paint (we use sugar spray, made from sugarcane and low toxic)
  • Outdoor space, drop sheet and masks
  • Stencils
  • Posca markers
How to:
  • Lay out drop sheet outside, get children to put on masks
  • Demonstrate how to use spray paint
  • Get them to practice by doing a background covering the board
  • Whilst drying get them to choose their stencils and work out their design
  • Demonstrate technique for stencils (lightly, moving hand)
  • Get them to add stencils, spray, overlap until finished
  • Once dry add further detail with Posca markers
The Results:

Some future street artists in this lot..

 

    
 

Variations:

My preschoolers and school class produced their own simple stencils by tracing their hands, cutting them out and then dabbing paint around them.  


 I didn't want to use spray paint with the school lunchtime class as it's too big (30 kids) so we used liquid watercolours in spray bottles instead.  These also worked out really pretty..

  

Cheers
FIONA

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