Ready to see some cool Super Mario fan art created using both traditional and digital art that feature some memorable locations and power ups?

Keep reading to check out these awesome images along with a list of effortless Mario drawing ideas and art style tips to give your creativity and art inspiration level up!

CONTENTS

1. Cool Super Mario Fan Art Inspiration
2. 25 Creative & Easy Super Mario Drawing Ideas
3. How to Draw in the Super Mario Art Style
4. Types of Super Mario Fan Art
5. More Exciting Video Game Art & Drawing Tutorials
   

Cool Super Mario Fan Art Drawings & Inspiration

1. Question Block in the Super Mario Art Style

Who doesn’t love a good ol’ Item Block?

If you want to draw very simple but extremely iconic and cool Super Mario fan art, try drawing a question / item block.

These iconic cubes are not only super cute but anyone can draw them. They’re yellow colored cubes with a giant white question mark that contain a range of power up upgrades to give Mario (or whoever you’re playing as) special abilities like flying, throwing fireballs, or even turning into a raccoon!

The painting below is an item block with a bit of a forest background reminiscent of the Super Mario World art style.

The image below is made of gouache – a water-based paint that is thicker than watercolors but thinner than acrylics.

Personally, I love painting backgrounds and landscapes.

So, I wanted to add a bit of background with trees and soil in the classic Mario art style to add a more interesting composition and look to the item block.

The colors I had on hand to paint these types of Super Mario fan art drawings are less bright than the art you see in the games but still highly saturated because these are colors that are normally used in plein air painting – a style of painting that involves natural looking earthy tones that are less bright in order to mimic the effects of natural atmospheric light and landscapes.

2. Cool Buzzy Beetle Super Mario World Fan Art

This next cool Super Mario fan art is based off the Buzzy Beetle found in Super Mario World for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES – the classic 16 and 32-bit pixelated games).

Go retro games!

I wanted to paint this little guy because like the reasons mentioned above, it’s one of those very simple Mario drawing ideas, especially when using an art medium that takes a bit of time to get used to, paint.

Not only is the Buzzy Beetle easy to draw due to the simplified Mario art style found in the games but it is something that you can finish quite quickly.

I love working on art that seems effortless to make because I can move on to the next idea fast without spending hours noodling on one piece.

Note: I may have added a bit of a protruding nose to the character design because I originally thought it was a hedgehog from the 16-bit pixel art design. Working from pixel art can be tough as smaller details can be hard to differentiate. So try to find a reference image that isn’t pixel art, like concept art or another artist’s artistic render when making your own fan art.

Working on fast drawings not only speeds you up in your art process but it’s great for making content fast when time is a huge factor in, especially when it comes to social media and you need to keep up with an algorithm.

Basically, working on simple types of (Super Mario) fan art boosts your overall quantity in art output and can actually help you in beating the social media algorithms if gaining a social following is one of your goals. It’s because not only do you have existing reference and IP to pull from but you’re not spending time coming up with a design.

Some character designs can take up to 2 weeks depending on what a client or studio asks for or even more!

So making fan art can definitely be a time saver, especially if you’re short on drawing ideas and need to come up with something quick.

3. Super Mario World Backgrounds

One of my favorite aspects about the Mario art style is the elongated rounded shapes and eyes that can be seen in some classic Mario backgrounds and environments.

There’s something about the soft rounded shapes that seem very fun, cute, and inviting. It’s because the backgrounds are so unique and different from other games when I first saw them. I just love their simplicity.

So, for one of my last Mario drawing ideas, I decided to paint a background from one of the earlier games – Super Mario World.

The painting below illustrates a typical background in the Mario art style.

Since most fan art focuses on characters, I wanted to create one of the more rare types of Super Mario fan art- backgrounds and environments.

I stuck with the games’ visual style by sticking with simplified shapes and rounded edges throughout the entire piece.

The green forms in the back are supposed to be green mountains, hills, and foliage.

I threw in a couple of squared item blocks in front of the greenery add a more 3D look to the scene. You can’t make cool Super Mario fan art if you don’t have at least 1 item block or notable symbol in one of your designs.

Some other details I added were making the clouds in a similar rounded rectangular shape. I did this because when drawing in a particular visual style, it’s very important to make the rest of the artwork look cohesive. All elements in an artwork need to look like it belongs in the rest of the scene.

For example, if I made the clouds look realistic, as cool as that would be, it wouldn’t match with the foreground elements and item blocks because the clouds wouldn’t be as simplified as the rest of the painting. If anything, the realistic clouds would look very out of place. Almost as if they were copied and pasted into the image. Very confusing and inconsistent.

So if you want to make some really cool Super Maio fan art, don’t forget to pay attention to the overall style you’re going for and try your best to make it look cohesive.

For awesome Mushroom drawing ideas, check out these 10 Dreamy Fantasy Mushroom Drawing Ideas or learn How to Make Stylized Mushroom Drawings Step by Step with this easy drawing tutorial.

Now that’s you’ve seen one of the many types of Super Mario fan art out there, it’s time to try making some of your own!

I’ve made a list below of how to draw Super Mario fan art with some effortless and easy Mario drawing ideas and styles that you can try right now.

25 Creative & Effortless Super Mario Drawing Ideas

Making cool Super Mario fan art is quite easy as the ‘Mario’ art style is stylized, cute, and simple compared to a more realistic approach found in other video games and films.

Of course, you can always draw realistic fan art if you’d like but it definitely involves more time and thought than simplified types of Super Mario fan art.

*If you don’t know who or what some of the names mentioned below are, you can search for them here in this Super Mario fan website.

Here are some quick and easy Mario drawing ideas to help kick start your drawing productivity and creativity right now:

1. Draw Super Mario as a baby, aka Baby Mario
2. Draw Yoshi
3. Learn How to Draw a Yoshi Egg
4. Princess Peach
5. Prince Toad
6. Prince Toad’s Hat
   • You can draw just Prince Toad’s clothes if you find drawing the character too difficult
7. Baby Bowser
8. (Regular) Bowser
9. Piranha Plant
10. Draw a Goomba
11. Draw Chomp – Chomp
12. Super Mario Powerups
    • Red Spotted Mushroom ( Level Up)
    • Star (Invincibility)
    • Fire Flower
    • Mario Feather
    • Mario Leaf – Turns you into a Tanuki / Raccoon
13. Draw the ‘Question Mark’ Coin Block
14. Sketch the Green Pipe
15. Make a Koopa
    • The little turtle guys with green, red, and yellow shells
16. Try Drawing some of the Backgrounds in earlier Mario Games, like those found in Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario World
17. Draw the Coins
18. Mario Drawing Ideas Dressing Up Sweets That are Wearing Clothes from the series’ Characters
19. Combine a Mario Character Design with Another One of Your Favorite Fictional Characters
    • It can be anything from fast food mascots to TV, Anime, Videogames, Books, and so much more!
    • *Drawing Fan Art Mashups have been pretty popular recently, try to see what you can come up with!
20. Try Drawing Mario in a Cartoon Style
21. Make a Pencil Drawing of Your Favorite Characters or things from the series
22. Try Making Cool Super Mario Fan Art in Watercolors
23. Make something in the Mario World Using Perler Beads
24. Create Your Own Pixel Art Using Mario-themed Motifs and Symbols
25. Design a Mario-Themed Symbol or Logo

Honestly, the list goes on and on. There’re so many more fun Super Mario drawing ideas to try that I can’t put them all here.

Check out this in-depth Super Mario Wiki for all things Mario related and start making your own types of Super Mario fan art. With a long list of Mario drawing ideas and inspiration, you can use the website as reference and decide what type of Mario art style fits you the best since some of the video games have very different visual styles than others.

Pro Tip: Making fan art is a fantastic way to get into drawing or start making art because it’s so much easier trying to copy something, especially when you’re first starting out, rather than create an original character. It’s a wonderful exercise and a great place to start practicing drawing. The only few downsides are (1) that I wouldn’t recommend putting fan art in your professional art portfolio because whoever is hiring you most likely wants to see your creativity and originality and (2) selling fan art is technically illegal because it infringes on the rights and usage of the original copyright holder / creator, meaning you can be sued. Here is an article by Art in Context that goes in-depth about whether it’s legally okay to sell fan art along with potential consequences.

How to Draw in the Mario Art Style

I’ve made a quick list of some pointers and tips to help you make draw in the Mario art style and what makes it so unique.

Style

When making cool Mario fan art, pay attention to the art style from the games. Since there’re so many video games in the franchise, narrow your favorite game to 2-3 and choose 1 and focus on that 1 art style so you don’t get too overwhelmed at first.

• Simplified Shapes
• Shapes have soft, rounded edges, not hard and sharp
• Enemies, backgrounds, and items tend to have long rectangular eyes in some designs
• Details are also simplified shapes
  • Details are less fine and usually big and/or blocky within main design shape

Color

• Colors are usually quite saturated & true to its solid color
  • For example, a red will look more like a true red than a purplish red
• Most designs are 2-3 colors, maybe 4-5 max but no more because it can get too busy

Characters

• Most characters are short and stout / chubby, except for a select few (princesses, Luigi)
• Have 2-4 colors max in their designs
• Limbs have plump rounded shapes
• Are usually in blocky proportions
  

Types of Super Mario Fan Art

Because the Mario franchise is so popular, there’re so many different types of Super Mario fan art on the internet made by some amazing artists.

Here’s a quick list you can Google of some of the many types of Mario fan art that exists:

• Realistic
• Comic Book Style
• Chibi – “Cute” Anime style with big heads and simplified shapes
• Still Life
• Mayan
• Japanese Animation
• Japanese Wood block
• 3D Render
• Cartoon Art Style

Check Out More Exciting Video Game Art & Drawing Tutorials

For even more imaginative pop culture inspiration, art, and freebies, check out these other amazing and easy drawing tutorials + game related articles below!

• 10 Dreamy Fantasy Mushroom Drawing Ideas for Beginners | Post
• How to Make Stylized Fantasy Mushroom Drawings Step by Step | Post
• How to Draw an Adorable Yoshi Egg in 3 Minutes for Beginner | Post
• Realistic Sci Fi Art Digital Painting Process | Post
• Download Free Studio Ghibli Inspired Phone Backgrounds | Freebie
• How to Draw Stylized ‘Six’ Fan Art from “Little Nightmares”  | Post + Freebie
• ‘The Matrix’ Photoshoot: 12 Cinematic Pics for Heroic & Imaginative Inspiration  | Post
• 20+ Creepy Yet Inspiring Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne Drawings | Post
• 12 Random Doodles to Draw When You’re Bored | Post
• 10 Art Inspiration Ideas to Jumpstart Your Creativity | Post
• Important Tips for Sketching on Silky Smooth Drawing Paper | Post

Hope you enjoyed this cool Super Mario Fan Art and see you in the next post!