We tried doing melted crayon art on canvas yesterday.
If you saw my Instagram pictures yesterday, you know that I initially planned to try out crayons in the hot glue gun, an idea I saw on Pinterest a while back.
This did not go so well, so we resorted to our standby of putting the objects in question (the canvas panels) into the oven to heat up and then drawing on them with crayons (which melted as they touched the hot surface).
This worked beautifully!
Melting Crayons Art on Canvas
MATERIALS
- Canvas panels
(you could also do this on watercolor paper
or other sturdy paper, of course)
- Crayons
- Oven
- Liquid watercolor paint
(or a watercolor paint palette)
INSTRUCTIONS
1. Heat your canvas panels in the oven. We set ours on a baking sheet in a 350 degree F oven for about 5 minutes at a time.
2. Transfer your canvas panel to your work surface and draw on it with crayons. Press down and draw slowly, to give the crayons a chance to melt as you draw on the hot canvas.
When the canvas cools down and the crayon stops melting, pop the canvas back in the oven for a few minutes. Then continue drawing.
A Few Notes for Success
- We protected our work surface from stray crayon marks with paper. You don’t really need to put down a towel or anything to protect it from the heat (as we do with melted crayon rocks or other melting crayon art) because the canvas panels don’t get too hot.
- If you’re doing the melting crayon art on paper though, you’ll want to keep the paper on the hot cookie sheet so you’ll need to protect the table with a towel.
- The crayons pictured are these push-up crayons from Stubby Pencil Studio, which we love. Any crayons will work, though.
Here are some of our finished melted crayon canvases ::
Maia painted a nature scene with her melting crayons, filling in the entire canvas panel with a tree, an owl, and a flowering shrub.
I also filled my canvas with melting crayon doodles and designs, using lots of colors, lines, circles, dots, etc.
Daphne made her signature free form artwork and continued to ask to do another, then another. Here she’s telling me about her four artworks and who they are each for.
3. Paint over the melted crayon art with liquid watercolor paints for a watercolor resist.
I asked Daphne if she wanted to add paint to any of her canvas panels and she said YES!
In the photo above, she’s carefully painting in the areas of her art with the watercolors. I’m always a sucker for watercolor resist art but think that this version over the melted crayon on canvas is particularly beautiful.
Here’s the finished collection of our melting crayons artworks.
Oh, wait! What’s that one with the black dots in the lower left?
Melting Crayons Art with a Hot Glue Gun
We finally got the crayon that was stuck in the hot glue gun to come out. I had just left the glue gun on, hoping to eventually get the crayon melted and out and it eventually worked! Sort of. It came out little by little, for the most part, and was not exactly a smooth process.
But Maia has requested that we try it again with more colors, so who knows… Maybe we will.
The regular crayons are too big for our mini glue gun (one got stuck when I tried to force it to work) and we need to buy some more chunky crayons if we’re going to give it another try with the regular glue gun. (We only had one chunky crayon that I could find, which is why there’s a glue stick poking out the back of the glue gun in the picture—I needed to add it to get the crayon to go through.)
By the way, here’s the link to the original youtube video of the glue gun and melting crayons art idea that I had found via Pinterest.
More Melting Crayons Art Ideas
- Melted Crayon Art on Wood and Blocks
- Melted Crayon Rocks
- Melting Crayons Art with Watercolor Resist
- Melted Crayons on Salt Dough Ornaments
- Melting Crayons Easter Eggs
Pin It for Later ::
Such a fun weekend project. Thanks for sharing.
In my preschool class this week we made melted crayon art using a warming tray. (I think in the 70s these were popular to heat casseroles on?) Basically it plugs in like a griddle, but it doesn’t get really hot, just pretty warm. The crayons melted beautifully on the paper we placed on the warmer and it was so much fun!
What watercolours do you use? We are repeatedly disappointed with the ones we get! xx
Beautiful! And, yes, please share your source for watercolors.
Hi – i love the colors your daughter used for the crayon resist. I think we need to try that this spring but ill grab canvas boards from the art store. I think 5 usually come in a package… :)
Last week we did something like your crayon resist on coffee filters and my 4 year old ended up wadding up an extra filter, wetting/squeezing it out and the dredging it in the watercolor tray and then wiping it on the round filter. She had so much fun. I love how bright the colors are on the canvas – very abstract but calming.
Hi
We have just tried your melted crayon on canvas project. We are in the UK and out our canvases in our fan oven at 170C for 5 mins and used chunky crayons. But alas, the crayons really didn’t melt. We worked out that around the edges would for a while probably because of the wood surround staying hot. Any advice would be gratefully received as my kids were so excited. We did repeatedly put them back in the oven but no better results were achieved.
Is it the crayon type or the canvas type????!!!
Many thanks, Jenny.
We just finished this. We used the thick watercolor paper. I heated them in the oven on a cookie sheet, but had to remove the paper to be drawn on. In a 350 degree oven as suggested, the sheet was too hot for them to work on. We also re-heated several times. Used Crayola Crayons. The crayon never did melt any, even when re-heated. We were left with lots of tiny white spaces. Fortunately the watercolor over it seems to help.
I am going to try drawing with crayons on the canvas and then putting in the oven. Seems safer and easier. I will let you know what happens.