Raise your hand if you have a poo-load of foam shapes at your house. Maybe you bought a bunch of them for a craft to do with your kids- their bright sponginess compelling you to purchase far more than you actually needed.
Or maybe you’re a twenty-something who can’t stop hoarding craft supplies. Yep, been there.
It’s time to break out those foam shapes and/or stickers and print with them. What?! Yep, true story. I found this idea on Blick and thought it was a phenomenal way to use up foam shapes, try a new way of printmaking, and play around with symmetrical composition.
Here’s what you need:
- Foam shapes or stickers. Got ours at Michaels, but you can also buy them here.
- Canvas boards
- Brayer/roller
- Acrylic or tempera paint
- Paper. I used white card stock and larger white drawing paper.
Mess around with the foam shapes on the canvas board until you like how they look, then glue or stick them down.
This is where Beckett chose to stop. He made SEVERAL foam sticker pieces, each one more wonderful than the last, until his robot finale:
Roll your paint with a brayer onto your palette, or – as in my case – an aluminum foil covered baking sheet. Roll paint onto the foam surface and press it face-down on the paper.
You can do a single print, or a repeating pattern of prints. You can use a single color of paint, or roll (or brush) different colors on to make a multi-colored print.
And- BONUS – you can make a freaking t-shirt if you want to. Use fabric paint or acrylic paint on a washed and ironed t-shirt. You’re supposed to heat set the shirt by throwing it into the dryer for about 20 minutes before you wash it for the first time, but I think we’ve only ever done that once.
I am a totally lazy crafter, by the way. Oh, and when you’re finished with the printmaking, you can peel the stickers off the canvas boards and use them to make little paintings. Bye Bye.
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