Ghouls, Monsters, and Creatures

This week, we are making creatures! I first discovered the art of imaginary creatures when I stumbled upon Carla Sonheim's blog, The Art of Silliness.

Then I took an "Unlock Your Inner Creature" class at Artists' Mediums, over the summer, with Kristin Richland. It was wonderful, and I highly recommend checking out her future creature classes! It went beyond the basics I've described below, to get your brain thinking more creatively! I loved it and have been inspired to make more creatures ever since!

Essentially, you draw any-old shape you want. You can draw it with your eyes closed, or trace the shape of an object you like. Then you add a few basic facial features, maybe some shading, and voila! A creature! Or, in honor of Halloween -- a few spiky teeth or lines for hair would make a pretty neat ghoul or monster!

Another way I love doing this is by painting (using your acrylic spray-paints or just making swishes on the page). Then, I look for animal- or people-like shapes in the blobs of dark and light paint patches. I trace them in black, then draw in simple shapes for facial features. I've been enjoying using my white gel pen (Uniball Signo) and a black artist pen (Staedtler Triplus Fineliner) (or any ol' Sharpie will do!) to add details and highlights on top of the watercolors I used below.

Here's one I did this week! There are more imaginary-creature examples on our Halloween Art Board on Pinterest, and I'll post more drawings and tutorials throughout the week!

Want to customize this activity for your toddler? Help them to draw or make shapes on paper. If they can draw dots for eyes, a line for a mouth, lines for hair, they'll have a page of creatures in no-time! If they're not quite ready to draw, cut out blobs of paper for creature bodies, and circles or other fun shapes that they can paste on their blobs, for creature facial features.

Want to share your artwork with us? Use #kasvtgallery on Instagram to be featured in Our Gallery!