Arya & Rishi

Arya and Rishi De Francesco are siblings who share a keen interest in art. Arya is 13 years old this year, and Rishi 10. They moved from Boston to Singapore last year, they love to experiment with various types of medium during their art lessons.

Left: Kiwi Fruit Pop Art, cross section (by Arya)
Right: Sushi Pop Art (by Rishi)
Medium: Acrylic paint on paper

Left: Starry Night (by Arya)
Right: Starry Night (by Rishi)
Medium: Air-dry clay, arylic paint

For these pieces, the kids created “Starry Night” (inspired by Van Gogh) using air-dry clay, focusing on making artwork very tactile. Arya and Rishi only started to paint on their pieces a week after the clay was dry.

First 2 from left: Green Parrot (by Arya)
First 2 from right: Red Parrot (by Rishi)
Medium: Acrylic paint on paper with double-sided foam tape

Arya and Rishi designed their parrots first by drawing the various pieces that formed a 3 dimensional parrot. They painted patterns on each piece and cut them out before assembling them. The different pieces are stacked on top of one another using double-sided foam tape. The thickness of the foam tape created a relief effect, adding depth to the paper parrots.

Left: Batik Painting (by Arya)
Right: Batik Painting (by Rishi)
Medium: Batik dye and wax

Arya and Rishi’s second attempt at batik painting. They painted on white cotton and the paintings were then fixed using a batik fixer so that the dye won’t run after washing. Their batik art was then machine-sewn into tote bags.

First 2 from left: Owl Christmas Clay House (by Arya)
First 2 from right: Santa’s Helpers Clay House (by Rishi)
Medium: SuperDough clay, plastic clear container, fairy lights

These Christmas clay houses come with fairy lights and they can be used as night lights! The De Francesco kids first added a thin layer of SuperDough clay on the plastic containers to create a wall. They left some areas of the container uncovered to make windows later on. After that, they made clay figurines and other Christmasy items to decorate around the houses.

You can find more Christmas clay house (made by other kids) here.

Left: I am a Pirate (by Arya)
Right: I am a Pirate (by Rishi)
Medium: Acrylic paint on paper

It is always fun to see yourself with a different perspective, don’t you think? Arya and Rishi imagined that they were pirates and painted what they would looked like.