Haunted House
Mixed Media
Now that Halloween is almost upon us I thought it a good idea to use this theme for the art blog post.
I hope you enjoy getting creative!
Why not take a look at the description of Halloween on Wikipedia if you want to learn a bit more about the history of Halloween, here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween
This is a mixed media piece, so you can use a combination of the following:
- Paper
- Pens,such as felt tips, sharpies or posca pens ( I love posca pens and have quite a few in my art box!)
- Colouring pencils
- Pastels
- Paint or ink
- Whatever art materials you can lay your hands on!
When you have finished your haunted houses I would love to see them, as I am sure others would too. We are creating an online gallery of work so if you would like to show the work then email your creations to:
How I started and what to include :
I looked at images online to get an idea for the shape that I wanted. Think along the lines of a tall haunted house, this seems the most effective to conjour up the feeling of a haunted house, wouldn’t you agree? Think about what makes something feel spooky.
That is what we are after, a spooky feel. I looked at what makes something feel haunted and spooky, so I have included :
- Spiders
- Cobwebs
- Pumpkins
- Black cat
- Ghosts
- Outlines of bats
- Moon
- Trees
Can you think of anything else?
I added some pumpkins to the pictures too.
Fun fact:
The pumpkin is known as a jack-o-lantern associated with Halloween . The name comes from the phenomenon of a strange light flickering over peat bogs , namely will-o-the-wisp or jack-o’-lantern.
There is an extra element that I have incorporated which you can add if you wish. I have created a bat, ghost and pumpkin using watercolour paper which I cut out and added to one of my pieces (using blu tack) It looks rather good because it gives a 3D effect to the drawing.
Let’s get started:
- Have a think and plan your piece.
- The size of the house- is it tall, and is this what makes it feel more haunted?
- The colours you will use – will you colour in the sky or keep it plain?
- What materials will you use to get your desired effect?
- Will you need to use a ruler or draw around something for a shape? For example, I used a bowl for the moon, see below:
Here I drew around a bowl to get the moon shape
Here is a break down of one of the haunted houses I have drawn:
1.Here I created the outline, I used a fineliner, or you can use a pencil if you wish:
2. I have added the outline of a bat and started colouring in the windows:
3. My house is going to be mainly purple:
4. I have added spider webs:
5. Here is the final image:
If you wish you can colour in the background a dark colour, but you need to make sure you leave space around other dark things ( like the bat) on the image so that it is visible, like this:
Here are the 3D pieces I added. I have simply drawn onto watercolour paper (because it is thick and can mean it gives a better 3D effect) and stuck it onto the piece with blu tack. You can use sellotape folded over itself, or some glue just in the centre of the pumpkin/bat/ghost instead.
