Collaborative Artwork With Babes

I finished a couple new "lil guys" this week- (that would be my little 5"x5" paintings).
The special thing about these two is that they are collaborative paintings with my
Mini-Main-Man Mosie:)

First I gave him 2 mini canvases and bunch of watercolor pencils- and let him go to town. I decided to use origami cranes as part of the printing composition in these 2 paintings.  Moses' bedroom design has cranes in it on the horizontal stripes around the room. 

I had this thought that I will give one of them to him, and keep one for myself- so, some day when he is all grown up and moves away he will always have this little part of something that we made together- pretty special:)

I first started making these collaborative baby-mommy paintings when Z was tiny- she and I made these 5 together when she was a little over a year.  They now rest on one of the window sills in my studio.  For these- I painted the surface color and etched into the wet paint and created a textured design. When they were dry I  gave a her a bunch of various pencils to create with.

I love children's artwork- especially baby/toddler artwork before it is "representational"- this is true abstaction to me. LOVE

I also made this piece for D fathers day 2 years back.  Z and I drew flowers on the canvas beforehand, and then I created a painting inspired by our collaborative drawing. (You can see her scribbles under the flowers, she also painted the "stems" of the flowering trees)  This is one of my favorite pieces still- and I love how you can see the inspiration and feeling of my leaf series in this painting even though I hadn't started them yet.

You should try doing a collaborative piece with your little one today!  I suggest getting a canvas- and picking a few colors for them to work with- let them inspire you!