tessellating stamps
We’ve been experimenting with geometry at Artschmart, and yesterday we tried making art with tesselating stamps (tesselating means the shapes fit together perfectly, with no overlaps or gaps, and It comes from the Latin word tessella, which means a small square stone or tile used in ancient mosaics) The connection with mosaics is fitting, since we are housed in a ceramics studio!
To try this out at Artschmart, we set up a small table with a tin full of wooden pattern blocks for open-ended explorations, and we covered the arterrarium table with paper, added foamies to some wooden pattern blocks to make them into stamps, set out some paper and giant stamp pads in a fun variety of colors and opened the door to see who would come in.
The first group that came in was a group with two art teachers (and moms), who were taking their busking teenage daughters on a Bay Area tour for the summer (but that is another story!) We invited them in as we chatted with the adults, the teenagers sat down and started making some really beautiful art by stamping the shapes onto the table. While they were working, one of the teenagers said “This is so relaxing!” and it really was a calm, meditative exploration of color and shapes around a small table with a group of friends.
The next group that came in was a mom with three children, and we showed them the table with the tin full of the wooden pattern blocks and let them explore making patterns. They tried fitting them together in different ways, making pictures and stacking them on top of each other, and the older kids started making geometric patterns with the blocks. After a while we showed them the table with the Stamps and invited them to try out the pattern stamps. The oldest kid had made a really intricate design out of wooden blocks and she set about trying to make it with the stamps, down to matching the colors of the wooden blocks. One nice thing about this project is that someone can either have an idea in their head like the oldest kid, or just sit down and start like the teenagers, and the way the shapes fit together can guide the direction they go in.
It was a little challenging for the youngest kid, but they loved stamping, and their older brother kindly shared their paper with them. The Arterrarium table is pretty small, and it was a bit challenging for the two different groups to fit together, so as the kids were getting started, the first family moved on. Someday soon, we’re hoping to get a dining table with leaves for Artschmart, so the table can accommodate a larger group. For now, we’re keeping it small and the experiments continue!
if you are interested in trying this out, the materials we used came from an amazing store called Lakeshore Learning.
Ingredients
Instructions
Hot glue the pattern blocks to foamies, then trim excess with an xacto knife.
Make a set of different shapes to go with each color stamp pad (the giant stamp pads are big enough you can take the lid off and place the set of stamps directly on it)
cover a table with paper for experiments and have smaller paper available if anyone wants to make their own design
Invite some friends over and have fun exploring tessellating art!
