Cut, squirt, spin

Those are your basic instructions for completing these great spun art paintings. This is one of the easiest and most attractive painting projects we've done. I found instructions here (via The Crafty Crow). I read them one day, recalled them several days later during a moment of great conflict and within about 5 minutes found myself enjoying peace and pretty paintings. Here's what we did.
I traced the bottom of the basket from our salad spinner (yes, the one we use-the washable paint came out fine) onto construction paper, cardstock, and cereal box backs. I cut out the circles. My children (and I, because it really was fun) placed them inside the spinner, one at a time, and squirted in some washable paint.
We spun the spinner.


We marveled at our paintings and removed them from the basket to dry.
That's about it. Except to say that after several paintings, I scraped the excess paint out of the spinner bowl into a glass measuring cup and used that as an additional color for the next group of paintings.
Now, if you want to get carried away like I did, keep reading.
After the paintings dried, I painted over them with acrylic gloss medium. This intensifies the color (construction paper, especially, is particularly dull), gives it a nice shine, and protects the paint.
Then I experimented with how to display the paintings. I liked simply taping them to string, ribbon or yarn and hanging them as garland.

I also liked hanging them in mobile fashion. The ones you see here would be hung flat up against the wall since the paintings are not double-sided, but you could glue or tape yours back-to-back and hang in space.
For these, we painted paper towel rolls and I cut 3 little holes down one side. I poked some yarn through and knotted it inside the tube. I just taped the yarn to the back of each painting, then strung a long piece through the top to hang.

This style of painting is fast, fun, and almost mess-free. Win-win-win.