Vivid Painted Mandalas
Fri, January 8, 2010 at 06:00AM 
The first two coffee filters were painted painted with watercolors.
Painting with fluid acrylics was a messier experiment. I cut the edges before painting. There are two basic methods. Wet with water first and then paint. Or paint, then drop water on the filter using a spoon. Painting a wet filter was more difficult, as it was easy to tear the paper.
Closer version of coffee filter on top left of photo above...
These filters were colored with neocolor II wax crayons. The top left (below) was painted while dry, then wetted. The top right filter was colore while dry (in this shot, it's not been wetted). If you paint water over neos, be sure to rinse the brush between colors so they wouldn't get muddy. My daughter (10) painted the lower right filter below. In this shot, she'd already painted the filter with water. My daughter (7) painted the lower left filter with neocolor swirls.
Here's one done with neocolor II's on a wet filter. This is one of the filters I colored with neocolor II's while dry. In this shot, it's been painted w/water.
This filter (center, above) was wet when I doodled with neocolor II's. Some of the neos dragged which tore the paper. The filters (top left/right below) were painted with watercolors on dry filters.
Today was a "snow day" of patches of icy roads and super cold (for North Texas, not necessarily the rest of the world). So the kids and I painted coffee filters! This was a fun project, an experiment using acrylics, watercolors and neocolors. The ingredients are simple. Coffee filters, watercolors, fluid acrylics, Caran D'Ache neocolor II wax crayons, water, paint brush. Under our work surface, I put an aluminum oven liner (pick them up at the grocery store, very useful).
The girls hung a bunch of colorful mandalas (aka filters) from the upstairs railing to catch sunlight. They also made "dresses' for simple Kokeshi dolls. As for me, I will be using a bunch in art journal backgrounds. Any type of abstract art is fair game for backgrounds!
Check out the Spooky Painted Webs we created for Halloween, including pix of the webs with the sun streaming through!
A note about Neocolors...
More details Art Materials for Art Journaling, Doodling + Beyond.
Caran d'Ache Neocolor II Artists' Crayons come in tons of vivid colors. I'd describe them as a mix between pastels and crayons. They Neocolor II crayons are water soluble. So you can draw them on a page, soften with your finger or "paint" them with a paint brush and water and they will dissolve about 50-75% (unscientific guesstimate). In the post on art materials, there are links to art done with neocolors. Neocolor I crayons are NOT water soluble.
Reader Comments (11)
These are wonderful Tammy! I really liked all the pictures! Are Neocolors watercolor crayons? I may want to
try some someday. Thanks for the inspiration. Can't wait to see how you use your new backgrounds!!
Round white coffee filters looks cool. Ours are brown and cone like, not pretty at all... The shape fits perfect for your colorful mandalas!
Those are really cool. I used to use tissue paper and do a project like that with my school elementary art classes. We used Crayola Markers because it was the least messy.
I've updated the post with add'l info about Neocolor II crayons in response to Eden's question.
beautiful! what a wonderful snow day project. they're like mini-mandalas!
What a wonderful idea, thanks for the creative jumpstart that I needed this morning!
I'm a Neocolor junkie and looooove their versatility. I've never tried experimenting on coffee filters though, but will definitely give it a whirl! Hugs, Terri xoxo
i got neocolors ll for christmas...love 'em! great idea to use coffee filters.
these are super - wonderful photos and colors! i may have to tackle this project with my girls!
I love making coffee filter art too! I like how mandala like yours are. I'm thinking I may have to try them again. We made them into flowers as a craft project at my daughters birthday party last year. With a bunch of five year olds, our were a little more abstract. :)
* Eden, I'm guessing that your next present to yourself will be neocolors?
* Leah, Thank you for visiting, it's incredible to see how many people are participating in AEDM this year!!!
* Hanna, I hadn't intended to draw a mandala on the filter, I had been thinking of a tye dye look but I guess I cannot escape mandalas.
* Martha, Thank you for saying hello! This project is not very messy - the paint is confined to the the aluminum tray. I hope you give it a shot!
* Chaotic Beauty, Always happy to provide a jump start. Just let me know when you need another!
* Terri and Stacy, Neocolors are unique, for sure. I use them on almost every art journal page!
* Aimee, I hope you will post photos of the filters you do with your kids!
* Melissa, I might do some more abstract ones next. I bet the 5's loved this project.
Thanks all! ~ Tammy