Fabulous Fun Folk Art

Who doesn’t love folk art? The bright bold colors, the fun patterns and the quirky materials all make up super exciting folk art.

My students looked at the fabulous art of John Sperry for inspiration.

Artist John Sperry

FLOWERS IN VASES

We absolutely love his flowers and the textures found in many of his painting.

We started with 12 x 12 construction paper, then with bold, bright colors of tempera paint we added a vase, stems and flowers. Then students chose one color of oil pastel and dragged around the oil pastel around the background, making sure to not totally cover the construction paper background. Some students chose to use tempera paint in the background as well.

Supplies Needed:

12 x 12 construction paper in various colors

Tempera paint in various colors

Paint brush

Oil Pastels in various colors

PORTRAITS

Using a pencil on 6 x 12 construction paper, students created a basic face shape. Suggestions for face shapes were square, round, rectangle etc.

Next with scrap paper, facial features were added. Overlapping shapes were discussed and students applied different shapes onto their portraits.

Next, tempera paint was applied on face shapes and a dry brush painting affect to the background. Let Dry. Lastly, outline with oil pastels the shapes of the facial features.

Supplies Needed:

6 x 12 construction papper

Scrap painted paper

Oil Pastels

Various colors of tempera paint