Unique Art Project for Kids: Use Sticks as Your Canvas

February 25, 2014 · by Chelsey · 6 Comments

In this art project for kids we use sticks we found outdoors as our canvas for sketching. The kids had an absolute blast trying out this unique art activity using natural materials!

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With the weather warming up, the kids and I have been spending much more time outside. All that outdoor time has given me the itch to get busy creating more art using natural materials! (We’ve previously used items from nature to make symmetrical art and woven with nature on homemade looms.)

Do you remember our salt art based on works by Motoi Yamamoto? (If you haven’t seen our salt art for kids post, be sure to check it out!) Another technique Motoi Yamamoto uses is besides creating with salt is to sketch on wood painted with gesso. (It’s really quite amazing. Not only does he create beautiful spiral sketches, but he actually photographs them and develops the negatives of the images on paper. You can see an example of this work here.)

I thought it’d be fun to try something similar here at home. Instead of using wooden panels, Lucy and I gathered sticks to use as our canvases! (This post contains affiliate links.)

Art for Kids Using Sticks

Materials for Stick Art

Sticks
White gesso (White tempera paint also works.)
Paintbrush
Colored pencils

Before creating your art you need to prepare the canvas. Rinse any dirt off your sticks and let them dry. Once they’re dry, paint a couple layers of gesso over one side of each stick. (We also tried this using white tempera paint, and it also worked. The surface just wasn’t quite as smooth as it was with the gesso.)

Once the gesso is dry, you’re ready to start sketching. Grab some colored pencils and have fun drawing on your stick canvas! Lucy drew all kinds of little pictures on her stick.