You can see Art Area Pt 1. for information about setting up your art are.
So the art area, just like any other area of the Montessori classroom, is part of a sequence. And it's easy to forget! Often the youngest children are drawn to the practical life and art shelves first, and it can be easy to let them wander through all the materials. But a 2 or 3 year old who has never had a lesson on elmer's glue and is squeezing the bottle out onto the floor is not going to help anyone!
When you design your art activity, consider who has the skills necessary for it. Sit them down and show them the entire clean up process. If they are not ready for polishing, or pouring in clean up, then they are not ready for watercolor and tempera paints. Keep them to crayons, colored pencils at first and gradually introduce the more advanced tools. If you have someone available to supervise and repeat the clean up process on the easel, then great, but if not, take things SLOW.
You can control who has access to what materials by making some of the containers hard to open. If a child has the concentration to unscrew a cap, they are more likely to be able to handle the materials inside of it with care!
Clean up tools: Aprons, Sponges, Spray Bottles, Towels
Painting:
Liquid Watercolor Color Mixing
Here we have a paint palette and three squeeze bottles with yellow, blue and red liquid watercolor. A small teaspoon can also be used to help the child control the amount of paint put in each cup. This is a great way to introduce secondary colors and clean up. You can include a sponge on the tray or have them get towels from a communal area to clean up mess.
Watercolor- The child must first be able to do sponging and pouring works in the practical life area before moving to this.
I recommend keeping the water container very small, though it will result in muddying of the paints faster.
Emphasize the clean up sequence which is :
1. Wet Brush 2. Pick Paint 3. Paint 4. Wipe Brush on Sponge (repeat)
Easel-The easel is the most difficult area to keep clean if you are using lots of paint (which you should be). I have tried limiting the paints at first, but ultimately found that you just have to let them make the big messes here AND make them clean them up. Follow through is important in this area. I like to start with a big brush and gradually reduce in size (going from gross to fine motor skills) BUT if you find that a child can't control the paint mess and gets overwhelmed by clean up, limit the amount of paint they have access and give them a tiny brush. Provide a big sponge and spray bottle for wiping the easel down.
I have a separate tray set up for brush washing in the PL area:
Dirty brushes are deposited here, then any child may fill the bowl up with warm water, then simply use the toothbrush to scrub any paint stuck to the brush.
Cutting
Envelopes! Kids love to take home their work and envelopes right on the shelf or tray will have them happily cleaning up. You can pick up a pack of security envelopes at the dollar store for $1 or you can make your own with some paper and a stapler. Here I have a simple strip cutting excersize for younger children. I try to also keep some lose scissors on the shelf for older children who can do more advanced and open ended projects.
Gluing:
Here I have two simple geometric gluing excersizes. I recommend the triangle activity if you don't have a circle punch, as it is much easier to keep stocked. I like this one because it also provides 1:1 skills and encourages patterning.
Any collage activity is great, and can be made interesting by rotating the shapes, colors, background paper etc.
Glue sticks or White Glue?
You can start them with glue sticks if you want to avoid a lot of mess, but the white drippy glue bottles will teach more self control in the long run. In this case I just recommend re-enforcing that the glue goes on the small object being glued, not the canvas. You can using your own smaller glue bottles, or glue brush to keep these.
Beading:
The BEST and cheapest beads are actually pasta! You can pour paint in a bag (liquid watercolor or tempera both work great), shake, spread out and let dry. This is fun to do with the kids, and it lets you dye them whatever color you want. You can do big pasta (like penne), textured like wheel or smaller styles like I have pictured here for different ages and motor skills and mix them all up! Stretchy cord or yarn paired with these on a tray will keep kids stringing and beading for hours.
Here's a really cute display by my coworker over at Montessori Dujuor made.
Drawing and Coloring!
I usually have blank paper, crayons and colored pencils out. I often put some coloring pages related to our monthly theme or science studies on rotation too. You can see my great artist or monthly theme posts on some ideas.