The Amazing Messy Wonder that is Finger Painting

Finger paint is historically traceable back to the first artwork painted by hand, literally, on cave walls.  Since then, we’ve had times where we have moved away from the use of this medium and shifted back towards it.  The act of finger painting is often associated with childhood- and seems to be attributed to the lower-level fine motor skills.  I’d like to make the argument here that finger painting is an artform that should be used way more than it is, and not just for children!

Think of it: playing with paints.  Actually feeling the colors and being completely linked to the placing and mixing of colors on paper.  You can make handprints or any shape you want.  Textured swirls may emerge or flat planes.  Colors can be kept completely separate or mixed together in an imaginative mess (which ups the level of fun involved significantly!!).  You can choose to fill every inch of the paper, or leave areas showing the absence of color with the white blankness of purposefully unused space.  It’s totally and completely up to you. 

As you involve yourself in this type of painting, the fear of the inner critic begins to fall away and you become completely entranced with the process.  Your confidence soars as you realize that it doesn’t matter because in this artform it truly is about the process and not about the final product.  So, you add more.  And soon your hands are completely covered in their own depiction of visual wonder.  This gives a new dimension of joy and pleasure to the activity.

In the 1930s, Ruth Faison Shaw- an American educator- spent time in Italy where she developed the idea of the use of finger paint for teaching children (Time magazine’s “100 Best Toys”).  It began to be used in schools and in art therapy as forms of play, learning, and self-expression.  Permissible mess, and involving multiple sensory systems, finger painting pulls attention into it so it can also be an activity of mindfulness. 

So, play away!  Get your hands into the colors and create a masterpiece of imagination and wonder.  Let the messiness flow and the laughter come right along with it.