Whimsical Artwork

• Doodle!! Doodling is a great way to loosen up your wrist, fingers, and your mind. It can relieve tension and get you ready for a fruitful artmaking session.
• Pay special attention to color to create mood. Bright colors are generally happy and uplifting. Darker colors are generally more somber or moody. Bold colors are jubilant and forceful. Soft colors are more calm and peaceful.
• You can add eyes or a face to anything to make it "anthropomorphic", or human-like. This is almost always endearing, as it gives human qualities and emotions to inanimate objects. It causes us to see those objects in a new way, and allows us to relate to them.
• Big eyes are often used to create a great "cute" effect, whether its big-eyed girls or big-eyed bunnies.
• Illustrate a scene from your favorite fairy tale. If illustrating a whole scene is too daunting at first, start by illustrating one of the characters. Use the written description as a starting point, and add your own changes or embellishments to make the character more your own.
• Pick one of the following words and create a character that illustrates that word: wacky, kooky, silly, spooky, goofy, cutesy. If you want more words to chew on, use a thesaurus, where you will find a slew of new and usable words!
• Check out some visual examples of other people's whimsical artwork:
  • Do a flickr search for "whimsical art", "whimsical painting", "whimsical drawing", etc.
  • Or have a look at these books, which were recently awarded Best Illustration Children's Books 2008
  • peruse the art of the wonderful whimsical Dr. Seuss

If you get stuck, remember these two important points: Let your imagination go wild. There's nothing holding you back - you can draw or paint whatever you can dream up! Have fun! Whimsical art is all about fun.

What is whimsical artwork?

Cute art is enchanting, addictive and bundles of fun! Check out the whimsical ACEO cards of Lemon Shortbread (shown left), whose colorful pop art practically jumps out and gives you a hug!