Ideas for Art Projects That Use Fall Materials
Craft Tea Sets, Dioramas, Shadow Boxes, Collages, and Murals
Oct 16, 2008
Parents and children often make fall crafts that use only one autumn material, such as leaves or pumpkin seeds. For a more complex project, why not create an art piece using a variety of artistic techniques and including a range of materials gathered from nature?
Preparation
Go on a nature walk with your child to collect materials. Gather leaves, twigs, berries, nuts, seeds and seed pods, grasses, bark, dirt, and even rocks. In addition, collect art materials in fall colors (reds, browns, oranges, yellows, golds), such as construction paper, tissue paper, foil, fabric swatches, felt, stickers, pipe cleaners, yarn, wikki stix, floral foam, glitter, markers, crayons, colored pencils, chalk, paint, clay, and so on. You can also have your child cut out fall-themed pictures or even just examples of autumnal colors, patterns, and textures from catalogs or magazines.
Make an Autumn Leaf, Acorn, and Twig Doll Tea Set and Tea Party
A tiny tea set made from fall materials will not last forever, but it's fun to assemble and play with for a time, and putting it together will give your child good practice with using his or her imagination and ability to think up many different uses for a material.
- Brainstorm with your child the parts of a tea set and a list of what you'd need for a tea party: cups, saucers, napkins, creamer, sugar bowl, tea pot, plates, forks, spoons, table, chairs, tablecloth, etc.
- Examine your fall materials and discuss what could be used to make each part of a tea party. For example, leaves make good plates, napkins, placemats, or even tablecloths. Acorn caps make adorable cups or bowls. Twigs make utensils. Rocks and bark make tables and chairs. Tiny bits of clay can stick materials together or be sculpted into additional dishes. Berries and petals can be tea treats.
- Once your tea party is all put together, take photographs for your child's art portfolio.
Make a Fall Scene Diorama
- Wrap a shoebox or other cardboard box in autumn-colored or patterned paper.
- Set the box on its side and line the bottom with floral foam or a layer of clay.
- Use fall materials to create a fall-themed scene, with twigs for trees, acorns and bark for people, and so on.
- Tape plastic wrap across the front to protect your scene.
Make a Fall Materials Display Box (Cornell Box)
- Show your child examples of original Joseph Cornell boxes and Cornell boxes made by other children. Discuss how materials are displayed inside each box.
- Make a case for your child's own Cornell box. You could use a greeting card box that comes with a clear plastic lid or a round oatmeal box lid or a shoebox lid covered with a taped-down plastic lid (cut to size) or a sheet of plastic wrap. You could paint a cardboard pencil box. You can even buy shadow boxes from craft stores.
- Have children pick and prepare materials for their box. Suggest that they focus on a theme.
- Children put together and seal their boxes. Note that they can use pieces of cardboard to divide their boxes into sections.
Make a Fall Collage Mural
Look at your materials and brainstorm techniques your child could use to create art with them, such as:
- stamp potato prints and apple star prints
- roll corn cobs coated with paint
- press and glue seeds
- glue cut-out pictures and photographs of fall subjects
- make finger, thumb, feet, and hand prints in fall colors
- glue traced and cut-out leaves
- glue real leaves
- make leaf rubbings
- use leaves as stamps
Then provide your child with a long piece of butcher paper and have him or her create a fall mural made from the materials of fall.
Working on these crafts will provide your child with an appreciation for the products of nature and the things that can be made with them, as well as giving him or her experience with artistic techniques ranging from assemblage to print-making to sculpture.
