When I draw tangles chosen at random, I sometimes get combinations that pose challenges. At first glance, it seemed like these wouldn’t combine well. But the tangle Sedgling suggested a garden theme… which is what I went with.
Here is a question: Are the Jetties falling like rain? Or floating up and away like seeds or pollen?
Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil.
These are “practice” tiles for an upcoming project for mid-July. I like them so much that I am posting them now. The middle one on the left doesn’t exactly have a name… It may be derived from Toodles (possibly).
For those of you who’ve done this project in the past: Shhh!
Zentangle drawn on a Zentangle, black, Bijou tiles. Drawing was done using several colors of Sakura’s Moonlight gel pens.
Dingbatz.
Dingbatz are the Zentangle version of printer’s ornaments called dingbats! They are small, ornamental areas of tangling that can be done on a tile, applied to an envelope, card or stationary. They could be used as stickers, or even used in your day planner to highlight an event or important appointment.
I am currently working through the “ Zentangle Dingbatz ” book by Brian Crimmins, CZT.
I decided to try a few ideas on a regular-sized, square tile for my first attempt.
Sometimes, I sit down to practice something in my small sketch book, and my pen has different ideas than I do!
Here, I was going to practice various tangles… and a “shapie” family just flowed out! There are still some tangles… can you spot them?
Small sketchbook page, drawing done with Sakura Pigma Micron pen.
Tangles: Bumper Fescu Mooka Printemps Springle
How do you challenge yourself? As an artist I’m always looking for different things to try as ways to grow and expand my skills.
Here, this tile was drawn entirely with my left hand. I even signed and dated the back with my left hand.
Why?
Well, first of all, I wanted to see if I could. In addition, drawing with your non-dominant hand builds new neural pathways in your brain. It also challenges you to look at things in a different way, and helps you to understand how your students, those that use a differnt hand to draw, are challenged to follow your instructions!
Another Beginner’s class tile #2! A fascinating thing about the Zentangle method is that no matter how many times you draw a particular tile, it will always be slightly different!
Zentangle drawn on an Official Zentangle tile using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil.
Tangles: Bales Ennies Fescu Printemps
This is my Tuesday morning Zentangle meditation class. These people are so wonderful to be with! They love learning, tangling and each other which makes being with them a total joy.
This week, they used an “A” shaped string and learned Bales, Ennies, Fescu and Printemps. The two tiles (one unfinished) in the lower right are mine.
I love how each of them is not afraid to try whatever variation they think of. They are adventurous spirits who are fearless students!
Perhaps, the Universe is pointing the way?
The next step of Beginner’s tangles evolving.
Zentangle drawn on an Official Zentangle tile using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil.
Tangles: Bales Ennies Fescu Printemps
Matt sent me this tile yesterday to post here. I’m always fascinated by the unusual elements he adds to his tangles! Sometimes it is his own interpretation of a tangle, sometimes it’s a tangle that is totally new to me, and sometimes it’s just a small, added tweak that captures my attention.
Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil.
Tangles: Fescu Pokeroot Striping
Amanda created this tile with the help of her family! She has four children that range in age from 7 to 17 years old.
She started by creating the string and then, each child would roll a dice and select a random tangle. The child would also choose where the tangle would go in the string.
The kids got a big kick out of challenging Mom, and they had a ton of fun. In addition, the final Zentangle came out great!
Happy New Year!
This Zentangle was created while going through all of my metallic and glitter gel pens. While they generally all have a reasonable shelf life, I have some that are more than 10 years old. They don’t work, the ink has separated, and some have even leaked. It was time to start fresh in the new year. So I used the tangles Aah and Pepper to create fireworks in the sky, representing the New Year’s celebrations as I tested the various pens. Unfortunately, they don’t all show up well when scanned, but you get the idea!
This Zentangle was done by Matthew Higbee. Matt is a 17-year-old high school student and a second-year art student. You’ve seen another tangle he did, here , previously, if you’ve been following this blog.
I love that he decided to take off on his own, and used tangles that we haven’t been practicing yet. I think he made good choices, and the tangles have nice contrast between circular and angular.
Day 2.
For this day, we are adding three new tangles to our repertoire: Fescu, Nekton and Knight’s Bridge. We were also instructed to practice making various strings.
For Amanda’s tile above, as you can see, her string is much more complex than on Day 1. She also used areas of repeated tangles to tie everything together.
Matthew did a wonderfully curvy string that gave him an interesting open space to fill with graceful Fescu! He decided to forgo any shading on his tile this time, because he felt it made his tile from the first day too muddy. I will be seeing him on Saturday, so I will give him a couple of shading tricks that should help him out.
Portals.
So many choices. Where will they all lead. Some appear to be places with natural growth and others more rigid, enclosed. So many choices.
Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil.
Tangles: Bucky Drupe Evoke Fescu Frondous Hollibaugh Sedgling Stoic Ticings Tortuca Vega
Window box.
As I sit in the chair by the window, perhaps this will be what I see.
Zentangle drawn on an Official Zentangle tile using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil.
Tangles: Aah Bumper Ennies Fescu Keeko Meer Nzeppel
Color.
This was the first Zentangle that I ever used color on. I even used my markers to create the shading. I didn’t do another full color Zentangle until this year, because I really didn’t like the way this came out, at the time. It just seemed too alien for a Zentangle. Now, I don’t mind color and actually enjoy it once in a while!
Zentangle drawn on Official Zentangle tile using a black, Micron pen. Coloring done with Tombow markers.
Something fishy.
This tile didn‘t start out to be an underwater scene. I was trying to decide which tangle to put in the space where the “eye” is. In the process of rotating the tile around and thinking, I realized it looked a bit like an underwater scene and the Shattuck reminded me of scales. So I added the “eye” (which is now a tangle called Caviar!) and the Fescu to look a bit like a fin. That completed the illusion for me.
Leftie-Louie.
This tile was done entirely with my non-dominant hand. That includes the shading and even the date and signature on the back. I was actually surprised at how well it turned out!
Zentangle drawn on Official Zentangle tile using a black, Micron pen.
Tangles: Crescent Moon Echoism Fescu Florz Nzeppel Pokeleaf Tipple
Back Yard.
Is this a view of the back yard from an odd angle? I couldn‘t resist adding the legs to the Worms and hanging the Bulb Lanterns from a hanger. And that gave the tile an outdoor feel!
Zentangle drawn on Official Zentangle tile using a black, Micron pen.
Tangles: Bulb Lantern Fescu Onamato Pods Unyun Worms
Silliness.
Every once in a while, I think my brain falls into some kind of alternate reality of silliness. I wasn‘t sure how I was going to tie all the different random tangles into the string I chose. So I just started drawing with the Btl-Joos… and things kind of evolved from there. The end result was weird but fun!
Zentangle drawn on Official Zentangle tile using a black, Micron pen.