Introduction
T-shirts can be marbled, batiked, tie dyed, airbrushed, printed and painted in just about any design you can imagine. There is such an abundance of possibility it can be difficult to know where to begin. Wearable art is oh so fun and painting T-shirts is an easy way to begin working with textiles. For today's lesson you will need to bring a T-shirt and we will paint it with Golden acrylics.

Materials

Directions
**Be sure to wear junky clothes for this lesson so you don't end up with paint where you don't want it, on your good clothes!

1. Slip a piece of cardboard into the shirt to keep the front and back from sticking together. You may also want to slip some waxed paper under the surface that you are working on. This will ensure that the T-shirt comes off the cardboard so you can put it on when it's dry.

2. Your T-shirt design can be anything you desire. A few ideas are: patterns (like stripes or polka dots) on the sleeves or over the whole shirt, suns and moons, seasonal themes (like fall leaves or snowflakes), abstract designs, your name in fancy letters, people, faces, landscapes, sea creatures, flowers, spaceships....I could go on and on.

3. Sketch your basic design on the shirt with a pencil. These lines are hard to erase so draw lightly and think before you draw. Use brushes of differing sizes and shapes to accomplish a variety of line widths. If you plan to cover a large area, use a larger brush. Don't use your paints too thick either or they are more likely to crack and peel off.

4. Use sponges cut in different shapes and found objects for printing on the shirt. Incorporate some painting and some printing for an interesting look. You might consider painting just the pocket area on the front or just a small emblem on one of the sleeves and then cover the entire back of the shirt.

5. Let the paint dry overnight before attempting to wear it. You can also wash it once before wearing (although acrylic paint will be permanent on any fabric as soon as it is dry).

Artspeech
Textiles–Materials (fabric or paper) made out of synthetic or natural woven fibers
Pattern–A decorative design usually of a repeated figure or motif
Abstract–Any art in which the depiction of real objects in nature has been subordinated or entirely discarded, and whose aesthetic content is expressed in a formal pattern of lines, shapes, and colors.

Resources

Mayer, Ralph. The Harper Collins Dictionary of Art Terms and Techniques. Harper Collins Publishers, New York. 1991.

Morgenthal, Deborah. The Ultimate T-Shirt Book. Lark Books, North Carolina. 1998.

T-shirt: A Design Library. Rockport Publishers. Massachusetts. 1995.

Buchannan, Celia. Tie-Dyeing. Chartwell Books. New Jersey. 1998.

T-shirt Airbrushing: The Step by Step Guide and Showcase. Rockport Publishers. Massachusetts. 1995.

Fresener, Scott and Pat Fresener. How to Print T-Shirts For Fun and Profit. Union Ink Co., New Jersey, 1994.

Back to the Activity Center