Mud Painting: Its 'Process' Art

Mud stations provide much more than just pretend cooking and mud pies.
Have you ever tried Mud painting?
It is pretty effective and I am sure you know that Mud painting isn't done for a beautiful product you can put on the fridge.
It is process Art: which means it is all about the exploration, learning and experimenting that the child experiences during the process of creating the art.

Here Dimples had lots of fun Stamping, Splatting and Stomping things in the mud.
He explored the different patterns made from the different shaped utensils and what happened when he used them differently; tilting them, rolling them, splatting them, stamping them, sliding them around to get different effects on the white paper.

The whisk and the masher were the favourites as they had the most effective print.
I had some plastic animals near by that he wasn't too interested in. He used a pig and a dinosaur to do foot prints. He made them stomp around for a while and rolled the pig in the mud but went straight back to the utensils.

Remember, Its the PROCESS that matters: Children's Process Art fosters sensory perception, it provides the opportunity to represent and symbolises real life experiences or just be freely imaginative, it offers children a chance to explore, experiment, learn by cause and effect, create and build, but most importantly it gives them the freedom to be an individual.
Creating an Art piece, in their eyes is a way for them to express themselves in the way they wish without having to conform. The process is fun and may be many different things to them. This freedom is what makes it special. So when it comes to children, forget about the beauty of their art and focus on what is being experienced.

What better way to explore the process and freedom of Art than with some Mud painting?

Happy Adventures :)