We've been doing a lot of spin art on a small scale in our classroom. We've used an old turntable with markers and paper plates. We've also used a salad spinner with tempera paint and cardboard cutouts.
Recently I found some instructions for building a large scale spin art machine using a power drill as the spinning motor. You can see in the picture below, it's a pretty simple set up. I built a frame out of scrap wood to hold the drill in place, then put a T-nut and bolt through a plank of wood and attached it to the drill. All you do is screw a canvas to the spinning plank, lock the drill in the on position, plug it in and start adding paint.
Here's a video of the Giant Spin Art Machine in action. I made a cardboard wall around it to catch the paint spray.
Here's how the above canvas turned out using acrylic paint:
I also tried using watercolor and a big sheet of watercolor paper with some nice effects:
Now it's time to see what the kids do with it...
