Creative Ideas for an Art Project

Use these creative ideas for an art project the next time you need something unique and interesting. The projects use most common media such as pencil, pastel, crayon and paint. Gather the few other supplies needed from any discount or hobby store. Repeat most of these projects more than once and still find them enjoyable. Use these creative ideas for an art project and express your inner artist easily.

Create relief prints with common white school glue. On sturdy paper, draw the outline of any object, design or face. Use single objects such as a face, leaf, flower, bug or shape for this project. Go over the outline with a single line of white school glue. Be sure to go over every line carefully and keep the line neat and smooth. Allow the glue to dry overnight completely. When dry, lay plain white drawing paper over the glue outline. Create a rubbing with a crayon, oil pastel, graphite or colored pencil by rubbing it over the white paper that sits on top of the glue line relief. This creates a rubbed print of your glue line design. You may choose to leave the rubbed print as a finished project. If desired, add detail line to the rubbed print with other media such as color pencil or permanent ink. Alternatively, create several copies of your rubbing print in different colors then hang them as a grouping in the style of Andy Warhol's pop art.

Create name art by first acquiring a long, rectangular piece of paper. Choose any size you wish but the bigger the piece of paper, the bigger your project. Write your name or the name of someone you know on the rectangle very lightly in large letters. Think of things that define or distinguish that person. Think about things such as hobbies, family, job, sport team affiliations, favorites of all types and heritage. Next, use your choice of media to recreate each letter of their name in miniature drawings of something that distinguishes that person. For example, draw or paint a letter made of miniature basketballs for a basketball player. Create a letter made of Japanese flag miniatures for someone of Japanese heritage. For each name, think of as many items to draw that distinguish that person as there are letters in that person's name.

Create a self-portrait from pencil, charcoal, paint or pastel on any size art paper. Be sure to have a plain white matte ready in the correct size for the paper you chose for the portrait. Complete your self-portrait as a bust or as a full body rendering. When finished, begin work on the matte by dividing each side into three equal sections with a black permanent ink line. Around the sides of the matte you should have 12 small boxes. Design a mini-drawing for each box that depicts an important scene or aspect of your life. Draw the scene with a suitable media for miniature drawing such as colored pencil or pen and ink. Create all 12 miniature scenes on the matte. Place the finished self-portrait inside the decorated matte.

Use cotton swabs to create easy pointillism style artwork. The pointillism style or technique creates pictures with hundreds or thousands of tiny dots of color. Pointillism artists use a very limited palette or neutrals and primary colors. To create the other colors they need, the artist places dots in colors that mix to make the desired color side by side to fill an area of the picture. For example, if creating a setting sun of orange, the pointillist places dots of red and yellow, the two colors that mix to make orange, side by side to fill in the shape of the sun. Normally these dots are extremely tiny. In this recreation with cotton swabs, use bigger dots to illustrate the technique and simplify the process. Complete this project by creating a sketch on drawing paper. Next, using a palette of red, yellow, blue, white, black and brown, fill in all of the drawing with dots created with the cotton swabs. Place colors that create the color you desire next to each other to fill in the object. Remember to make a lighter color, such as pink, use red and white dots together. Also, remember that the secondary colors of orange, purple and green result from the primary colors on your palette. When finished, step away from your work to admire it. Notice how the eye and brain blend the colors together so that for example, yellow and blue dots placed side by side appear green.

Create a dramatic portrait in tints and tones of one color. Carefully sketch your portrait lightly on heavy weight paper or canvas. Prepare a palette of white, black and one other color of your choice. Yellow and other pale colors do not work well for this project. Pick a rich, intense color. Mix paint to create the lighter tints by mixing small amounts of your chosen color with white. Mix as many lighter tints of your color as you can create. Create the darker tones of your color by mixing a little bit of black at a time with your chosen color. Mix as many darker tones of color as you can create. Paint the portrait in halves. Create an imaginary line down the middle of your portrait. Create one side completely in tints of your chosen color. Create the other side completely in tones of your color. The resulting tint-tone face imparts a dramatic effect.

Study then recreate famous artists work with a personal and creative twist. Examine the style and subject matter of any famous painting enough so that you can recreate it. Before beginning, think of a personal twist to add to or change in the masterpiece and make it your own. For example, study "Twelve Sunflowers" by Van Gogh in which he paints a vase full of warm colored flowers against a cool background. Study the arrangement of the flowers and position of the vase. Recreate the painting but change the sunflowers to another favorite flower arranged in precisely the same manner as the sunflowers. Keep the same cool background and warm flowers or change to cool flowers and warm background. Alternately, study then recreate Van Gogh's "Starry Night" but instead of his European scenery, create the same starry night sky over your hometown. Include landmarks from your town or state in the village below your rendition of his "Starry Night." You may choose to study then recreate one of Monet's impressionistic garden paintings created in his garden. Use his same style of impressionism, dabbing on many muted colors to create your picture but rather than his garden and pond such as in "The Footbridge" by Monet, paint your own garden or favorite water scene.