As I mentioned before, I am on a quest this year to bring more Easter cheer into our house this Easter. To do that, I’ve come up with some simple Scandinavian inspired easter decorations. The second Easter decor project is our graphic watercolour Easter art – some simple wall art, which is both watercolour and geometric. It was very quick and easy to make, so easy in fact that our three-year-old even assisted, at least with step two.
Graphic watercolour Easter art
What you need
The beauty of this graphic watercolour Easter art project is not just that it is so simple that a three-year-old can help, but that you need nearly nothing to make your own.
- Cardstock or aquarelle paper
- Watercolour paints or pencils (or whatever you prefer to use for your watercolour work)
- Paintbrush and water
- Black marker (I used a 1.5 – 3 mm marker from Edding)
- Ruler
- Frame, such as the simple IKEA Fiskbo frame.
Instructions
1. Choose your shape
The first step is to decide on what motif to use for your graphic. I chose a bunny for one piece and some eggs for Easter. I downloaded my egg shape online and just printed it out, scaled to three different sizes.
I could imagine a wreath or star for Christmas, a star for July 4th, a pumpkin for Autumn, a maple leaf for Canada Day, a heart for Valentine’s Day or a balloon for a birthday. I’m actually planning to make a big M for Miss M’s room in this style.
Cut out each shape, place over the cardstock or page where you want the image to be and trace around the shape. Alternatively, you can just draw the outline of your image freehand.
2. Add the watercolour
Once you have the outline, use watercolour paint or pencils, or even watered down acrylic paint, to paint your watercolour background for your graphic watercolour Easter art. There are two different approaches you can take here. I tried both and they each have their charm.
One is to keep the watercolour within the form, where possible. The group of three eggs and the bunny are just done with watercolour paints on cardstock using this technique.
Alternatively, you can let the colour bleed outside the motif or even deliberately paint outside the shape. The additional egg was done with watercolour pencils on aquarelle paper. Just shade the area you want with the colours you want, then lightly brush with water.
Miss M helped with both alternatives. Admittedly, her main job was pointing to where I should put each colour, but she also did some of the painting for the larger egg.
3. Add the graphic elements
Once the paint has dried, take your black marker and outline your shape, simply drawing over the pencil outline you created in the first step.
Pick and mark a number of random points around the outline as well as ‘intersections’ within the shape and mark these with a dot. I found it easiest to pick points where different watercolours met.
Using a ruler, draw a line connecting one point and the closest intersection. Continue to do the same with the next point, and the next, then draw lines (with the ruler) to connect each intersection with one another. If needed, add more intersections. Continue until you like the look.
4. Frame
Finally, frame and hang (or lean) your graphic watercolour Easter art and enjoy!
Make your own graphic watercolour Easter art
I love it when a project comes together just the way I imagined! This graphic watercolour Easter art took next to no time. Seriously, waiting for the paint to dry took much longer than the rest of the steps.
They are so simple, too. You need almost nothing to make them and a young child can even help with the most enjoyable step.
Finally, you can simply choose the colours and the motif to suit your decor. In our case, we wanted happy rainbows to chase away the bad associations with Easter.
So there really is no excuse: make some graphic watercolour Easter art this Easter!
Don’t forget to check out our wire Easter egg ears and our Scandi-inspired Easter decor.
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