Sunprints

Making Sunprints is the perfect sunny day activity.  

What is a Sunprint?

• Sunprints are cyanotypes that are created by exposing light sensitive paper to the sun.

What is a cyanotype?

• Cyanotype is an old photographic printing process that dates back to 1842!  A print is created due to a chemical reaction of the UV light and iron on the paper.  The beautiful deep blue image is known as a cyanotype!

First we went on a nature walk to gather items for our Sunprints...leaves, branches, those whirley helicopter things were abundant that day!  We observed all the beautiful things that were blooming and growing now that it is finally (almost) summer!

Step 1.  Place items on special Sunprint paper (Arranging them beforehand in a practice run helps so you can work out your composition)

Step 2.  Let the items sit undisturbed on the paper for 1-5 minutes.  (We did it at about 4pm so we took up the whole 5 minutes).  You know your print is ready when it turns very light blue, almost white.

Step 3.  Once it has turned light blue/white quickly take off the items and "develop" the paper by rinsing it in water for about one minute.  Your image will be very light but the background will darken as it dries.  Kinda like magic.

p.s.  You can find Sunprint paper or Nature Print paper at Blick or you can order it online.

Spring has Sprung!

It's getting nice out!
Perfect for painting alfresco!

Op Art Paper Weaving

Op Art - meaning Optical Art
The idea is when the viewer looks at this art it almost seems like the piece is moving or vibrating.  There can be patterns, hidden images and lines that look like they are warping, bending or swelling.  Kinda makes you dizzy right?

Famous Op Artists are Bridget Riley and Victor Vasarely

I was thinking about how I could recreate Bridget Riley's "Movement in Squares" with my kids.  The idea of drawing, coloring and painting the very precise lines seemed a little hard, then I thought of paper weaving and it came out great!

Materials needed:
- Extra large construction paper in Black and White
- A big paper cutter is great if you have one!
- Scissors
- Ruler
- Pencils
- Glue

Ahead of time, cut the white paper into 3 or 4 different sized strips

Directions: (Picture tutorial coming soon!)
1.  Fold the big black piece of paper in half.
2.  Take the ruler and trace it across the open ended side of the paper
3.  Then use the ruler to trace vertical lines from the top line you just drew all the way down to the bottom folded edge
4.  Cut the lines you just drew
5.  Open it up and start arranging your white strips into piles by their size.
6.  The idea is to start weaving the white strips in, varying the size of the strips to mimic Riley's painting.
7.  Push the strips tight together and once they are all in and you are happy with the way it looks, glue the edges down to the black paper.