diy {goodwill print to Paint by Number art}
My favorite subject in school was art. During my senior year all the AP art studios had studio spaces in one big room. We had free creative reign to decorate as we wished. I shared a spot with a guy named Chris (not the Chris I married). I ate most of my lunches in the studio laughing with that crazy bunch of art students. Good memories. Another memory from my days in art classes was the practice of changing paintings. All the way back to elementary art classes I remember being given photocopies of paintings or drawings from famous artists and being instructed to paint or color over the original work. It was a good practice in learning how to draw and learning different techniques. So for craft week, I thought I’d show you how to do it.
A while back I picked up a poster/print from Goodwill. I mainly bought it for the frame, but I kind of liked the flowers too. Well last winter I covered all the paintings in my living room with wrapping paper and taped Christmas cards to them. When I took the paper off, the tape peeled the corners of this painting. I’ve been meaning to replace it and then thought it would make a fun Paint By Number painting. So here are some basic steps to do your own:
Supplies: acrylic craft paint, Acrylic Sealer/Finisher Glossy
Here are some tips on Paint By Number paintings:
* There is no blending together of colors…the colors are more like blobs with very defined edges
* The more colors you use the more complex (and time consuming) the painting
* You can combine similar shades. For instance, if there are 5 different tints of yellow near each other in the original..combine all 5 into one yellow for your Paint by Number, unless you want it more detailed.
* Florals and landscapes are the easiest to tackle for a first time project.
To begin: Pick a main color and begin painting over it using defined edges…think BLOBS of paint. If your picture has tons of colors I recommend taking a step back and seeing what the strongest colors are…then begin painting those areas. Just keep going from there….
Did you know we have a large sycamore tree in our backyard? It is where we do most of life…hence the name of this blog Under the Sycamore! When I craft I usually try to have the kids doing something similar near me. I did some of my painting outside while the kids did their spin art. On a side note: this is one of my kids favorite ‘toys’. When we run out of paint I use my acrylic craft paint (3 parts paint, 1 part water) in the little bottles.
You can see on the painting that I continued to add more colors. I choose to use colors a lot brighter than those in the original painting.
Continue on until the entire painting is covered. I did opt to the leave the top background of mine untouched…I like the eclectic feel of it that way.
Once all the painting was done I sprayed an Acrylic Sealer over the entire thing. I chose to go with glossy to give it some shimmer.
And then hang it back on your wall.
If you are wondering if that is a branch with cupcake liners hanging on my living room wall…well, Yes, it is. Doesn’t everyone do that?
