My colour mixing and painting family workshop in Bethlem Museum of the Mind

I can recommend taking some time out to mix and create your own colours.

That is part of what we did at my recent workshop at the wonderful Bethlem Museum of the Mind  (an ArtFund Museum of the Year finalist)  And we all had a wonderfully focused, creative time.

I started by serving over 20 plates like below, to adults and children of all ages from 5 to over 70...

one palette of blue, yellow, magenta red and white poster paint

Armed with this substitute palette, a couple of brushes (one doing the job of a spatula and one for painting) and a long strip of paper to paint on,  the first aim was to mix as many colours - as possible out of the 3 primaries - including black or near black.  

Here are 4 vertical strips each by a different workshopper.  They are almost like colour signatures. Everyone comes up with their own  amazingly distinctive colour range (and brush marks) from the three primaries.

4 vertical strips of colour made with 3 primaries.
Adding some white extended the range of beautiful chromatic greys.

One adult told me how soothing they found it.  And in the concentrated atmosphere, as ever the children worked faster.  Adults were still creating colours while a 4 and 7 year old had already started creating characters.

We then looked again for inspiration at a wordless picture book by an unknown artist, following a child's imaginary journey.  Part of the Bethlem Museum of the Mind's collection, it is currently on show with some other amazing works in their current Youtopia exhibition.

The adults caught up with the kids, and created their own amazing characters...

exploring strange scenes...

and  familiar worlds,  here work by a 7 year old left and his dad (right) 

 All in all, what a perfect workshop for Ott, from my book Tiz and Ott's Big Draw!