For our learning the other day we made egg tempura paints and then painted with them. The children enjoyed crushing up the chalk to a fine powder with rocks before mixing it with some egg yolk and water.
We used stones we collected from the east coastline of Tasmania on a earlier trip around that way to crush the chalk into a fine powder. Then we whisked egg yolk and water together to make a frothy mixture. Once this was done we added in the crushed chalk to give the paint base some colour.
The results were stunning. Our first batch of paint was too watery and did not have enough pigment (chalk) in it. Therefore it stayed moist longer allowing for us to paint easily before the paint dried. But as Egg Tempura paint is supposed to be fast drying and lend itself just to short strokes with a paint brush, the second patch of paint we created from the egg yolks, chalk and water was much more ‘authentic’ and true to itself.
Recipe for Egg Tempura Paint
- Chalk Sticks. 2-3 small chalk sticks per paint colour or one large sidewalk chalk stick per colour.
Crush chalk into a fine dust. We used stones to do this but a mortar and pestle would work very well.
- One egg yolk per colour
- 2 teaspoons of Water
Whisk egg yolk and water together to form a froth mixture – like for scrambled eggs. Add in Chalk dust to mixture. Mix in well. This will then form a thick paste. The texture should be very thick. If it is not then just add more chalk until it is.
The result was stunning paints with a goldish shine to each colour.
