40 Art Trivia Questions for Kids

1. On a traditional color wheel, where do complementary colors sit?

2. What do artists add to a paint color to make a tint?

3. What do artists add to a paint color to make a shade?

4. Which group belongs to the warm side of a traditional color wheel?

5. A painting uses only blue and lighter or darker blues. What does monochromatic mean here?

6. In art, which word names how light or dark a color is?

7. Which stand holds a canvas upright while an artist paints?

8. What is the flat board an artist uses to hold and mix paints?

9. What is the strong, plain-woven cloth commonly stretched over a frame as a surface for oil painting called?

10. Drawing charcoal is traditionally made by heating which material with very little air?

11. Which liquid is used to thin watercolor paint for a wash?

12. Which drawing material comes in sticks of powdered pigment held together with a binder?

13. What is the name for a quick drawing used to try out an idea?

14. Which paper is specially made to be see-through so you can copy outlines?

15. What is the special oven used to fire pottery called?

16. Which pottery tool spins a flat disk while the potter shapes a bowl on it?

17. A potter builds a bowl by stacking long ropes of clay. Which method is this?

18. Which pottery method shapes a small bowl by squeezing clay between fingers and thumb?

19. What coating can form a glassy surface on pottery when it is fired?

20. A picture is built from many tiny pieces of tile or glass. What art form is it?

21. Which craft decorates cloth with stitches made using a needle and thread?

22. In weaving, what are the threads that pass across the lengthwise warp threads called?

23. What kind of picture focuses on a person, especially their face?

24. An artist paints a picture of themself. What is that picture called?

25. What kind of painting shows outdoor scenery such as hills and fields?

26. A painter arranges a jug, an apple and a cup on a table. What kind of picture is this?

27. What do we call a painting made directly on a wall?

28. Which part of a picture appears closest to the viewer?

29. Which kind of art can use colors and shapes without showing recognizable objects?

30. What do artists call the way a surface feels, such as rough or smooth?

31. Which drawing technique shades an area with rows of parallel lines?

32. Which drawing technique creates shading with lots of tiny dots?

33. What art technique joins pieces of paper or other materials onto a surface?

34. Which art form makes objects that have height, width and depth?

35. What is a sculpture with hanging parts that can move called?

36. What kind of sculpture has raised shapes that stay attached to a flat background?

37. Who made the famous woodblock print The Great Wave off Kanagawa?

38. Which artist is known for a series of paintings called Water Lilies?

39. Which activity fills Edgar Degas's painting The Dance Class?

40. In his Four Seasons portraits, Giuseppe Arcimboldo built faces from which things?