Negative Stencil Projects for Kids

Any type of cutout of a positive image can be used as a negative stencil.

Teach children about positive and negative space with negative stencil projects. Positive space is an art term that typically refers the defined space around an object, such as an apple. Stencils with images, letters or numbers are actually the negative space, and you form the positive image when you color inside the stencil. Projects using negative stencils, which consists of the positive images, help reinforce this conceptual relationship.

Cave Paintings

Use your hand as a negative stencil.

Create art like the prehistoric cave paintings found in Lascaux, France, where numerous images of animals and handprints exist. Use brown grocery bags as the wall by tearing off 10-by-15-inch pieces and forming them into a ball. After the children smooth out their papers, instruct them to place their hands onto the paper and blow a mixture of tempura paint and water from a drinking straw over the hand as a negative stencil. Lift the hand to reveal a handprint with paint around it. Experiment by blowing paint onto other negative stencils, such as leaves and stones.

Positive and Negative

Use complementary colors for negative space projects.

Transform a regular stencil into a negative stencil project exploring positive and negative space. Trace the inside of your favorite positive stencil, such as an animal, onto colored construction paper. Cut out the positive image and use it as a template by tracing it like a negative stencil onto a different color of construction paper. Carefully cut the outline around the new template you have created, which is the negative space, and remove the animal or other object. Paste the positive and negative images side-by-side onto another piece of colored construction paper to form an artwork.

Sun Projects

Use the sun for summer art projects.

Harness the power of the sun to form a negative stencil project for kids. The children can take a nature walk or look around the house to find objects to use as negative stencils, such as scissors, flowers, acorns or coins. On a sunny day, place the objects onto colored construction paper into a specific design outside on a picnic table or the ground. Wait approximately one hour and the objects will become negative stencils. Remove all the items. The paper around each stencil is lightened, while the area underneath each object is darker.

Silhouette

Frame your silhouette to give as a gift.

Making silhouettes is a classic negative stencil activity. Silhouettes are an outline of an object and clearly define the positive and negative space. Start the craft by taping a white piece of paper on a wall. Ask your child to stand in profile in front of it to use him as a negative stencil. Have someone shine a flashlight at your child to create a shadow on the paper. Trace the shadow and cut it out. Use it as a template for a piece of black paper. Complete the silhouette project by gluing the black cutout onto heavy white paper.

Resources

• Lascaux: Home