mural – Painting Around is FUN! Painting Collaborative and Inclusive Social Art Projects

Group mural creation with Painting Around is Fun - Our Soccer Mural Painted with school kids (primary / elementary) — Group mural creation with School Kids ages 5- 13.

At Ascot Park Primary School, we embarked on a group mural creation with the Specialist Soccer Team. We brought together 26 students to transform their soccer practice “Hitting Wall” into a vibrant mural showing teamwork. Using my Pattern Play Collaborative Art approach, we guided the students through three simple stages. The first stage was Messy Playing, where creativity flowed freely with big brushes and spontaneous marks. Next was Exploring, where detailed layers were added to build depth and texture. Finally, we reached Bling, the step that brought the mural to life with intricate finishing touches. The result is a stunning, multi-layered mural that the school community enjoys daily, reflecting both creativity and collaboration.

Group Mural Creation 1: Underpainting: Setting the Foundation

The project began with a solid foundation—a vibrant underpainting that would serve as the base layer for our mural. The students used large brushes and rollers. They applied broad strokes of primer mixed with colour to the wall. This established a solid backdrop. We focused on warm tones like red, orange, and yellow. These colors created a feeling of energy and motion. They set the stage for what was to come. The underpainting not only helped unify the mural. It also gave the students confidence to start creating without worrying about perfection. It was all about getting the first layer down and warming up the space for further creative exploration.

Group Mural Creation 2: Messy Playing: Freeing the Creativity

In this phase, the students were encouraged to loosen up and have fun with the mural. We introduced a variety of tools—sponges, stamps, templates and stencils—to add playful and spontaneous elements. This messy playing stage is all about creative freedom, allowing each student to make their mark without fear. By layering bold shapes and spontaneous patterns, the students brought energy and movement to the mural. This step let their ideas flow naturally. It gave the artwork an organic, fluid feeling. This is much like how a soccer team works together dynamically on the field.

Group Mural Creation 3. Exploring: Building Layers of Detail

The playful base was established. Then, the students began to explore more intentional techniques. We aimed to bring depth and complexity to the mural. They used finer brushes and simple patterns. They layered these designs on top of the earlier marks, creating quite intricate areas. They added subtle details in similar colours and the patterns created a sense of unity across the mural. The patterns used were an early form of my “Pattern Play” visual resources. I now use them for every project. I also offer them for sale at my online shop. During this project, I laminated the simple hand painted pattern ideas into A4 sheets. The sheets were scattered around. They were stuck up to give the kids ideas to copy. This scattered approach provided inspiration to create. Kids added their own ideas too. Every contribution was guided and encouraged, and each layer added more visual interest. This phase gave the mural its distinctive character. Students worked in sync and painted around each other’s contributions. They created a cohesive design that reflected their teamwork.

Group Mural Creation 4: Bling: Adding the Final Touches.

The finishing stage was all about adding that extra sparkle and final polish to the mural. Using a dark crimson for a pop of accent colour, and attention-grabbing elements like fine detailing, we added the “bling.” This stage helped emphasise focal points and brought a sense of completion to the mural. Each student’s name was included in the design, giving them a personal connection to the finished piece. The final touches made the mural truly shine. It was not just an artwork. It was a reflection of the students’ hard work, collaboration, and team spirit. They were so proud as they had ownership of the entire creative process.

Group Mural Creation: In Conclusion

This group mural creation at Ascot Park Primary School not only brought the students together. They created a stunning work of art. It also transformed the “Hitting Wall,” a space they use daily for soccer practice. The mural now serves as a constant reminder of their teamwork and creativity as they play. One of the most rewarding moments was hearing the kids run around the corner at recess. They squealed with joy and amazement when they saw the mural taking shape. The students engaged the stages Messy Playing, Exploring, and Bling. Through this process, they embraced Pattern Play Collaborative Art. This approach helped them create a vibrant, layered mural. It will be enjoyed for years to come.

Learn easy tips to develop group mural creation ideas on your own: Join my Inner Circle email list. I’ll give you “Starting Your First Social Art Project at Home”. It’s my free 7 page guide. It makes it effortless for you to paint a unique artwork using this fun style of collaborative art.

Happy Painting! Charndra, Your Inclusive Social Art Guide.

Let’s Chat:

What are your favorite group mural creation ideas for bringing people together through art?

A collaborative art work called "Find Your Confidence" created by teenage girls as part of a social mural and social artwork project, showing swirling pinks, reds, peaches and yellows over a blue and aqua background.

Collaborative Art Work Project created by Primary School Children - Swirling blues, greens and aquas called "Aspiring to Success"

A collaborative art work painted by adult women who are carers of children with special educational needs, showing multi coloured circles, spirals and dots in overlapping patterns, called "Parents Time Out" Social artwork.

Discover the Thrill of Creating Collaborative Art Work!

Collaborative art work is awesome. Creating a painting with a group of people brings you together with a group of people in a shared creative experience. You grow in confidence as you are painting companionably with others, moving from place to place, interacting with what each other are doing, layering and overlapping. Your skills and confidence is build without comparison anxiety and performance pressure that we all feel painting our own individual artwork.

Let’s have a look at three collaborative art works from my own collection of social art projects:

Find Your Confidence in Creating the Layers of a Vibrant School Mural!

This collaborative art work: “Find Your Confidence”, was the ‘mobile mural’ part of a public mural in their school, Aberfoyle Park High School in South Australia, which takes the mural inside on a canvas, it was painted alongside the large wall mural. This collaborative art work was created in a freeform style – in a guided spontaneous form, with the girls directed to start painting circles, spirals and dots of different sizes and colours, then adding to the elements of each other, adding layers of patterns and marks, building on the visual complexity over several weeks.

Reflection:

This collaborative art work was created by a group of teenage girls. They painted out in public, building their confidence, realising they can do MORE than they may have thought possible – that people walking past watching them paint could be ‘zoned out’, and in fact those people were highly complimentary about what they were creating!

Aspire to Success by Using the ‘Success Strategies’ of Collaborative Art Projects.

This collaborative art work “Aspire to Success” was created by 120 junior primary students over three sessions and relates to the school logo of IQRA College in South Australia. The kids had a great time in several rotating groups, each level of kids doing a different stage – the reception kids did ‘Messy Playing’ with sponging, stencilling and scraping, the grade 1’s did ‘Exploring’ with medium and small brushes, and the grade 2’s did ‘Bling!’ with paint pens, stickers and glitter glue. SO many kids! This is a detail from 2 collaborative art projects created over three sessions.

Reflection:

This is one of two large canvases – needed with this many children, that’s for sure! The teachers told me of some children did more in this novel situation than they would in the regular classroom – it’s the novelty and the ‘group painting’ that enables shy children to be more adventurous as they can in some ways hide as they create with each other – moving around and being free to explore. They build their creative confidence and can then feel more able to create in their individual art.

In this collaborative artwork, created in only one session, we used brushwork, stamping, layering and overlapping. It has a mixed colour palette. These days I would have a coloured background (the underpainting) and then layer cool then warm colours. Really, a background that is not stark white is a game changer! There’s many ways of doing it – one colour, an ombre, using spray paint, using blotches of colours – all impact the final artwork, and most of all – an underpainting frees people to begin! That white canvas is very much a visual block.

Reflection:

This was the first collaborative art work I did with a group of fellow parent carers in our “Parents Time Out” activity for mums with children with special educational needs. This is when I first felt the thrill of collaborative art, and led to the hundreds of artworks created with over two thousand people so far.

3 Collaborative Art Works – Conclusion:

These three collaborative art works show how a variety of groups of people – young children, teenagers and adults enjoy creating together, and in doing so paint truly unique artworks developed from the dynamics of their group – whether that be ten ladies or 120 little kids just starting school. They have fun!

Discover how to create collaborative art works like these – Join my Inner Circle email list so I can give you “Starting Your First Social Art Project at Home”, my free 7 page step by step guide making it effortless for you to paint a unique artwork using my three fun stages with a group of people in your life.

– Charndra, Your Inclusive Social Art Guide.

Let’s Chat:

I love spirals. Circles turn into spirals. Big, small, open or tight spirals look great on an artwork – they are my favourite shape.

What’s your favourite shape?