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7 Sidewalk Chalk Art Tips for Creatively Inhibited Adults

Humor Experiment #2: Chalk it Up to Creative Experimence*

By Chris Dunmire, CoachingYourCreativity.com

When I was a kid they didn't have big boxes of colorful pointy crayon-like sidewalk chalk like they have today. We used the standard small white or yellow chalkboard chalk, or if we were lucky, a chunk of drywall (plasterboard) scavenged from a neighbor's curbside on garbage day (the big soft chalky center between the cardboard-like paper was perfect for smudging all around).

Ignorance WAS bliss... we didn't conceive of colorful chalks in a rainbow of reds, oranges, yellows, greens, blues, indigos, and violets so what we did have in chalkboard white and yellow worked for hop-scotching and doodling on the pavement. (Come to think of it, my little mind never connected that colorful pastels from art class were really in fact... CHALK!)

As a grown-up, I believe that chalk drawing on the sidewalk is mandatory child's play (see my project How to Play Creatively with Sidewalk Chalk Art). And if you're an adult and missed out on THAT fun when you were little, I have comforting news for you. You can take your inner child by the hand while gripping a piece of sidewalk chalk in the other and DRAW upon the energy of your little one and just let go in squiggly squaggles.

Yes, you can. You wanna know why? Because the huge box of 24 different colored Crayola sidewalk chalks I bought over the weekend has the age guidelines printed right on the front: " 4+" and the "+" means any age above 4, including YOURS! (Look, if they didn't want adults playing with chalk, they'd print "4-18", so there.)

If that's not enough to motivate you to action, I'm going to help you along. Here's a secret guide I developed over the weekend while courageously doing chalk art on the sidewalk... by myself... in the daylight... in plain view of my neighbors. I advise the following for you artistic avoiders:

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© 2007 Chris Dunmire, CoachingYourCreativity.com. All rights reserved. (05/21/07). Please do not duplicate this article elsewhere without my permission.

About the Author
Chris Dunmire is the author of the Dollar Bill Origami Money Plant and driving force behind the popular Creativity Portal Web site. She finds meaning as an artist, humorist, and creativity coach and channels her overactive imagination into multiple containers on display at ChrisDunmire.com.