Garden Gnome Art Project
Well, this gnome is about the cutest little creature I ever did see! The best part is, there’s lots of room for creativity and it can be done at any time of year. Do a spring gnome, a winter gnome, a Valentine’s gnome…anything you want. You can jazz it up in whatever way you see fit.
Time required: 1 hour
Materials:
White paper (one full sheet and one half sheet per student) - printer weight is fine or you can use card stock
Black construction paper (small rectangle per student)
Skin tone construction paper (small square per student) - I like to use the colours of the world paper so that students can choose whichever skin tone they’d like for their gnome.
Alternatively, colour a nose with markers, pencil crayons etc.
White pastel (white crayon won’t give the same effect)
Tempera paint
Paint brush
Pencil
Scissors
Glue stick
Steps:
Sketch the outline for a body and a hat on the white paper. Remember to think about the size of the hat in relation to the body. I made mine a little wavy but do the hat and body however you’d like.
Use a white pastel to draw some designs on your hat. A white crayon will not give the same effect so if you don’t have pastel, just allow them to paint the hat whoever they’d like. I only did designs on the hat, not the body so that it wouldn’t be too busy. If you prefer, you can do a patterned body and plain hat but I’d avoid doing both patterned.
Paint the body and hat. We will be cutting them out, so don’t worry too much about the edges.
While your body and hat are drying, prepare the rest of your pieces (beards, nose, shoes).
On the half sheet of white, sketch out a beard and cut it out.
On the black paper, sketch two shoes and cut them out.
On the skin tone paper, sketch a big oval nose and cut it out.
I used my pastel on the nose and shoes to give a bit of “shine” but this is not required.
Once your body and hat are dry enough to handle, cut them out.
Assemble your gnome. Body - shoes - beard - nose - hat.
