Materials: Paper (bigger paper is more fun!), drawing implements (pencils, markers, charcoal, etc. Nothing that needs to dry for a long time.)

Steps: Fold the paper into three sections. Starting with the top section of the paper, each student draws the head of the character. When they are done or when the time is up, students flip over the paper, leaving section 2 exposed. Before passing the paper along, students continue their drawings just enough into section two that the next student can tell where to begin. In section 2, students continue another student’s drawing by adding the body. This happens again for the legs in section three, when the Exquisite Character is complete! It is a good idea to have the students write their names next to the heads they draw in section one so that they can find their original works to see what has become of them.

This is a surrealist game, born from a similar game called Consequences which was played using words rather than images. The invention of the game is attributed to Andre Bretton, French Poet and early surrealist artist. An example of a sentence from the game Consequences: “The completely black light lays down day and night the powerless suspension to do any good.” As a later addition to collaborative surrealist art games is one called Photoshop Tennis or Layer Tennis, born in the 1990’s in which one player “serves” and image to the other and it is passes back and forth between the artists, each making additions and manipulating the image on their turn. This would be a great project for advanced students learning Photoshop or similar software, or could even be done as collaborative collage at a younger or more basic level.