Ancient Egyptian Projects

The artwork of the Ancient Egyptians has been a massive influence on artists and designers since the first tombs were uncovered and Primary Schools have used the Egyptians as a theme for as long as I can remember. It’s been one of the most common subjects for artwork that I’ve been asked to create with children, not surprising when you think that the majority of the information we have about them comes from their art, sculpture, architecture, pottery, costume . . . even their writing was pictorial! This year marks the 100th anniversary of the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun and obviously this brings the history of this amazing culture back into focus once more. I’ve created a few projects here based on items that were hidden from our eyes for over 3000 years and discovered inside this famous tomb.

Firstly, I’ve created this ‘Cardboard Tube Anubis’ simply using cardboard tubes and my ‘pure making’ technique, where all of the initial materials get used. Anubis, represented by a jackal, was the Egyptian ‘god of the dead’ who accompanied kings and queens into the afterlife. To create this sculpture all you need is two short cardboard tubes (or one longer one cut in half), masking tape, scissors, watered down PVA glue, black tissue paper (or black paint) and some gold paint (or a metallic marker) to add the decoration.

This is a great technique for creating animal heads and could easily be adapted to make a variety of different animals. You could try making the other three gods which the Ancient Egyptians used to decorate the ‘Canopic Jars’, the containers that were used to store the Pharaoh’s internal organs! You could also create a complete sculpture of Anubis using this as the head, the Egyptians represented Anubis either as a jackal or sometimes as a human figure with a jackal’s head.

My second project is a ‘Paper Plate Scarab Beetle’. Scarab beetles were a popular motif and decoration used by the Ancient Egyptians and my example is based on a protective amulet placed on the body of Tutankhamun. I’ve simplified this Scarab design slightly and tried to use the pieces cut from the design to glue back on to add to the 3D effect.

The symmetrical design means that you can fold the plate and then concentrate on just half of the image. For children this might be easier if you give them a template, just for the main beetle body shape, then they can sketch the rest based on reference photos. I’ve added a scan of my design here to help . . . you could print this off or copy the basic body design.

In my version I really tried to make the different elements fit into the plate and follow the contours which were already there which is great fun and really brings out the textures when it comes to painting. I washed a base coat of gold paint onto mine first but obviously you don’t have to do that, younger children would probably enjoy painting their designs straight onto the white base. You could even use markers to outline the design first if you thought that might help.

Here’s a nice playful painting idea based on an Ancient Egyptian ‘death mask’. This ‘Symmetrical Pharaoh’ is created by making a fold down the centre of the paper and printing each colour from one side to the other. For mine I’ve used blue paper as the base but it doesn’t have to be, you can paint all the colours onto a white background. It is nice though to limit the colours, you only really need gold, black, white, and a couple of shades of blue paint.

It can take more than one try, especially if you take a little too long, but that’s ok, that’s part of the fun. Also, if something ‘bleeds’ a little too much, you have to adapt and try to incorporate it. Or, alternatively you could wait for that part to dry and then overpaint that particular section. You could also try painting other Egyptian gods or goddesses using this same technique.

Here’s a great 3D transformation, ‘Wooden Spoon Tutankhamun’ is the most complex of this group of Ancient Egyptian ideas but definitely worth an extra bit of patience. The materials are pretty easy to get hold of, some scrap cardboard, a little bit of tissue paper (or kitchen roll), some gold, blue, and black paint, and of course, an old wooden spoon.

Although their seems a lot of stages to this project you can easily simplify it, for example, you don’t need to make the face 3D, you could just make the cardboard headdress, paper mache over the flat spoon and headdress and then paint the ‘face’ and ‘stripes’ on once dry. This would make this idea suitable for much younger children. You could also make a template for the headdress shape, which after all is the only complex bit of drawing here. Maybe you could even try making other Pharaoh’s, or gods and goddesses?