Ink from everyday objects

Let's explore how everyday objects can help make ink. This activity guide introduces making ink using flowers and leaves and its use for a painting.

Activity Resources

Materials Required

Flowers and leaves
Lemon juice
Salt
Baking soda

Age Groups

This activity is suitable for ages 10 years & up. We recommend children under the age of 12 to use Kitchen appliances as required in this activity under adult supervision.

Facilitation Tips

Before introducing the activity, discuss with participants:
- What is color?
- Which everyday objects around them give colors?
- What gives everyday objects different colors?
- What is ink? How is it different from color?
- What is the content of ink?
- How many types of ink exist?
- How will they use colors from everyday objects to make ink?
- How will they use these colors & ink?

Introduce the activity using the activity guide in a PDF format, demo video, and voice note. You could encourage participants to make ink using everyday objects and use it for their artwork.
Encourage participants to use the process shown in the video only as a reference and use other natural or human-made materials to produce ink such as turmeric, coffee, tea, soot, soil, fruits & vegetables, etc.
Ask participants to share their process of making colors and ink, what materials they used, and how they changed the original color from an object in a certain way.
Inspire participants to tinker with ink and colors by sharing some examples, such as the below artworks that use natural pigments made by Nikita Gandhi, a self-taught artist, and educator.

Inspiring artist

Nikita Gandhi is a self-taught artist and educator from India. She develops artworks using natural pigments and everyday sustainable materials. She has been interested in learning by doing activities for children throughout her career. She has worked at several schools and NGOs and taught children to make toys from things around us and junk. At her last job at Marudam school, she worked with children exclusively, exploring Arvind Gupta toys and Sudarshan Khanna's toy-making book.