Looking Closely At Your Favorite Animal

I love animals and so do most people that I've ever met.  Its clear why so many children's art projects have animals in them.  Its a fun topic and a great tie in to pets or a trip to the zoo.

This project includes looking at the patterns and textures on an animal as well as their silhouette.  A pattern refers to the repeating image that happens again and again.  An example would be stripes on a zebra, or spots on a leopard.  A texture refers to what the fur or skin would feel like.  An example would be, a giraffe looks fuzzy but the hair also looks kind of stiff, or a squid has suckers that look bumpy and a little slimy too.  A silhouette is an outline of something that is filled in with a solid color.  In this case, your animal will be a black silhouette.  Before photography was invented, it was very popular for people to pay to have their profiles cut out into silhouettes by artists.

This is an easy project that only gets cooler looking the more that you do!  If you work with a large group of kids, try to make each piece of artwork a different animal.

Materials You Need To Make an Animal Silhouette with Pattern and Texture:

• Black paper (I suggest 8.5" x 11" or larger)
• Pencil
• A sheet of white paper (I suggest 8.5" x 11" or larger)
• Scissors
• Glue Stick
• Color Pencil or Oil Pastel  

*For more advanced kids, you could use tempera or acrylic paint

How To Create Your Masterpiece of the Animal Kindom:

1. Start by choosing your favorite animal and think about what pattern its skin or fur has and the texture on its skin or fur.
2. Using your Black Paper and a Pencil, trace the outline of your animal, carefully including any specific parts of its body that helps identify it.
3. Cut the outline of your animal out of the black paper and put it to the side.
4. Using your White Paper, lightly draw the pattern of your animal's skin or fur all across the page.  
5. Using your colored pencils or oil pastels, fill in the colors inside your pattern.  As you do this, consider what the texture might feel like and how you can convey that in your line quality.  If your texture is fuzzy, use short soft strokes.  If your texture is spiky, use long specific strokes.  Or, if its bumpy like our octopus example, we left white areas around the suckers to show the suckers being raised above the skin. 
6. When your background is complete (and dry if you use wet mediums), glue your animal silhouette, using a glue stick.  Make sure you glue all the way to the edges.  Hint:  When applying pressure to glue your black paper down, press smoothly and evenly from the center out, taking care to press down all the way to the toes, fingers, hooves and tails.

Tips: 

This is a GREAT project to do after going to the zoo.  I take my students to the zoo and have them make sketches from the live animals before doing this project.

Clean Up:

• After your masterpieces are complete, wash paintbrushes immediately so they'll last for many more paintings.  Make sure to clean up any leftover glue, paint or oil pastels on your tables with a damp rag.  If you are using a nice table to work on, cover it first with plastic or newspaper.  Hands can be cleaned with mild soap and water. 

And, remember:  Art, like any other skill is a practice which gets better each time you do it!