Coloring contest!

I always did like coloring! Letraset is having a coloring contest and you could win a set of ProMarkers.  Find the mandala template here: http://letrasetblog.com/craft/colouring-challenge-3/
Color it, post it, put your link on their site and cross your fingers! Here's mine.

Grids

Weekly challenge number 37 is to use only tangles that are based on a grid. Do a curvy pencil string, draw a grid overall, and fill with tangles. This is something I do in one of my advanced classes and the results are quite interesting.

On my first tile I somehow got an extra section than the string gave me, but I like it.

Tangles: Bales, Dex, Gingham, Florez, Florz, Ninja Stars, Zanella

Laura (the Diva) suggested the idea of curvy grids, so I tried one that way too.

Tangles: Bales, Bateek, Demi, Florz, Puf, Screen

Here are tiles done by some of my students using this same idea.

Tangles: Bales, Cubine (with corners), Facets, Gingham, Screen, Up and Across

Clara

Friends of my eldest daughter just had a baby girl, and my daughter asked if I would do a name for them. I know Clara's father, and have met her mother's parents, and thanks to Facebook I've even seen Clara!

Tangles: Assunta, Bales, Black Pearls, Cadent, Coaster, Finery,
Florez, Flux, Hollibaugh, Ixorus, Keenees, Knightsbridge, Miranda,
Parabola, Paradox, Prestwood, Purk, Shattuck,
Tidings, Tripoli, Unyun, Yincut

It's 8"x10" so they can pop it into a ready-made frame if they want. I began with an acrylic wash in three colors. For the letters I used cardboard cut-out scrapbooking letters as stencils. Then I did a pencil string over the entire thing and went at it with pens in various colors. I finished with pencil shading in various colors and a bit of white and pale blue on the letters.

PARADOX, and then some

Here are Zentangle's instructions for the tangle Paradox, from the February 2008 newsletter.

Paradox is one of my favorite tangles and I seem to do it rather well. Perhaps those two things are related! :-)  I've been asked about it occasionally, how did I do this or that. I thought about doing a video but that's just a bit more than I can take on right now. So I decided to post some tips and ideas here, and hope to make them clear enough.

 TIPS!

TIP #1:

The elegant curves show best if the lines are close together. See the difference.

TIP #2:

Agh! But what if you accidentally leave too much space between some lines? Simple! Just add a line or two between the ones that are too spacey, like this:

Then again, never say never. I tried deliberately leaving wide spaces that I then filled with other tangles. You can see the results here.

TIP #3:

Paradox works best in triangles or squares. It's not bad in a pentagon but gets worse and worse as there are more and more sides. For one thing, the center deteriorates quickly as you move in. Besides, drawing a fairly regular shape with more than four sides, freehand, is quite a challenge. Stick with squares and triangles.

TIP #4:

There are two looks that can be achieved with Paradox. In my classes I call them "Fans" and "Twists". Here they are:

Paradox is essentially a square or triangular spiral. These two effects are obtained depending on which direction you send your spirals.

TWISTS: Regardless of whether you spiral clockwise or counter-clockwise, if you spiral in the same direction in every section you'll end up with twists.

FANS: To get the fans you need to spiral in the opposite direction from section to section.

Starting with squares

Starting with triangles

If you prefer to be less technical and more intuitive, you can look at what's happening in the section adjacent to the one you want to work in, and note where the lines need to converge and where they need to splay out.

TIP #5:

Munchin is a tangle that flows particularly nicely placed next to Paradox. Others that could work well this way are Tri-po, Facets, possibly Hibred (scroll down the link). I can also see possibilities for Tripoli (another of my favorite tangles) and Betweed.

This is a rectangle divided in three. The red arrows show where the divisions are.

 AND THEN SOME! 

THEN SOME #1:

Paradox also makes a nice border design. Start with a row of squares or triangles, then decide whether you want fans or twists.

THEN SOME #2:

An interesting variation is to fill in every other stripe. Don't do this going around the spiral the way you did the tangle. It's too easy to get confused that way. Begin on one side and fill in to the center, then move on to another side.

THEN SOME #3:

The triangles or squares you use don't all have to meet neatly at the corners. Interesting things happen when they're placed randomly. You can also use a mix of triangles and squares.

THEN SOME #4:

Sometimes when I'm doing Paradox using squares there's an odd-shaped section, like a trapezoid. (What a great word!) I've found a few ways of dealing with this challenge.

One thing you can do is separate that end bit and deal with it on its own. This leaves a triangle and you can fill it in a number of ways:

1) fill the triangle with Paradox with a twist effect
2) fill the triangle with Paradox with a fan effect
3) fill the triangle Munchin style to extend the fan
4) fill the triangle Munchin style in the other direction

Another option is to fill the odd shape entirely with Paradox, adding an extra line or two occasionally as you're spiralling around. You need to think about the direction of the spiral in order for the extra lines to fill the proper space. The aim is to get the (temporarily) empty center area looking more like a regular square.

THEN SOME #5:

Never say never, right? While the classic Paradox is done entirely with straight lines - thus the paradox - it can also be done using curved lines. It takes a little more concentration.

THEN SOME #6:
If you're feeling confident, here's something to try: partial Paradox! This requires imagining what's not there, but (of course) it doesn't have to be exact or perfect. Here you can see:

1st: a string
2nd: other tangles (Crescent Moon, Florez, Keenees, Prestwood, Tripo), with two sections left blank. The solid green line makes a nice square in the section where I want to put Paradox. Normally I'd draw it in black. Then there's a dotted green line where I need to imagine the far edge of the other Paradox square.
3rd: one and a half Paradoxes and the final section filled with Gingham

THEN SOME #7:

Paradox in a paradox. See the Paradox section in the lower left of the tile below? Going from the point in the center, there's a Paradox triangle, a Paradox square, and a partial Paradox. In the square section I did Paradox until about halfway in, then, I reversed direction! Cool!

Other tangles here: Moving Day, Ninja Stars, Screen - all mine!

 FINALLY

Here's a pencil string, some notes about what I did, and the Paradox result:

There are more examples of Paradox in other Zentangle newsletters here (scroll down) and here (scroll down).

I was about to throw out all the examples I did for this post when I thought, "Hmm. Let's stick 'em all together and see what happens." So here it is, the all-in-one (minus one) Paradox visual tutorial!

 HAVE FUN! (and congratulations to anyone who stuck through it to the end!)

THIS JUST IN!

August 2011: For another take on Paradox, using a two-sided shape (how cool is that!) see the Zentangle blog post for August 26.
June 2012: for a cool variation that I call feathered Paradox see my blog post of June 22, 2012
August 2018: See Rick Roberts' post "Paradox Metaphors" here.
April 2020: Another variation, Crazy Paradox, here on my blog.

Mount Assunta

I could have called this "All Assunta, All the Time". I think this is one of my new favorite tangles!

Tangles: Assunta (with hints of Bateek, Black Pearls and Yincut)

PRESTWOOD - a new tangle!

My mother loves Canadiana antiques. For a while she was a member of a furniture refinishing group. One of her projects was a pair of pressed back chairs. The chairs have an interesting pattern on the back. You could see where this was going, couldn't you?

It's fairly simple and I think lends itself to some interesting variations. Here's how to do Prestwood.

Here are some tiles with Prestwood.

Tangles: Assunta, Black Pearls, Dust Bunny, Finery, Hibred, Munchin, Ogen, Prestwood, Spinners

Tangles: Crescent Moon, Flux, Prestwood, Puf, Striping, Tipple, and a Knightsbridge Aura

Tangles: Assunta, Aura, Beeline, Caviar, Prestwood, Rain, Scoodles

For an interesting variation of Prestwood, developed later, see this post.

DUST BUNNY - a new tangle!

After Amaze and perhaps Knightsbridge I think this is the simplest tangle I know. Only two steps! However, the shading outside the spiral is essential. You don't need to shade absolutely everywhere along the line; most of the area will give the desired effect.

Dust bunny? For those who may use different expressions, a dust bunny is one of those balls of fluff that seems to appear from nowhere under furniture.  This tangle also resembles a rabbit's tail! Here are two tiles using Dust Bunny:

Tangles: Caviar, Dust Bunny, Flux, Marasu, Purslane (or Flux variation), spiral and dots

Tangles: Dust Bunny, Emingle, Flukes, Miranda, Munchin, Rick's Paradox, Seljuk

Forget the house cleaning. Tangle some Dust Bunnies instead! :-)

A tile on a tile

If you check in at the Diva's weekly Zentangle challenge you'll see that I am this week's guest challenger :-) and I've challenged everyone to create a "Tile on a Tile".

A while ago I started a Zentangle tile with a very wide border. As I drew, it began to look like a mini-tile on a standard tile, so I developed it in that direction.

Tangles: Hibred, Knightsbridge, 'Nzeppel, Rick's Paradox, Seljuk tangleation, Striping, Yincut and dots

I rather liked it and tried a few more.

Tangles: Chartz, Florz, Hollibaugh, Jash, Miranda, Tidings

One attempt resulted in a black tile on white. The white space needed something more than just the tendrilly lines so I added some shadows of the lines.

Tangles: Chartz, Crescent Moon, Ixorus, Lotus Pods, Rain, Snookums, Strircles

I recently began my first altered book project - a small, square book remarkably titled "Art Tiles", discovered by my eldest daughter, Chloë,  in a second-hand bookstore. I'm sure it will take a while to complete and I think some of these Zentangle 'tile-on-a-tile' pieces may find themselves in it!

Tangles: Caviar, Florz, Flux, Miranda, Mooka, Munchin, Opus, Partay, Screen, Unyun

Tangles: Cockles 'n' Mussels, Festune, Keenees tangleation, Lotus Pods, Striping, Tipple, Zedbra

Opposites Attract

Christina Vandervlist, the guest challenger for this week's Zentangle challenge, proposes a brilliant but simple idea (aren't all brilliant ideas basically simple?). Round and curvy vs. straight and angular. NO! not "vs.", rather working in harmony! We are to create a string with only straight lines and fill the tile with curvy tangles OR create a string with only curvy lines and fill the tile with angular tangles. Brilliant. Simple.

I had to try both.

Here's the one with a loop-de-loop string and angular tangles. After the pencil string I drew a grid in ink over all. Then I used all tangles based on grid patterns. This is something I do in one of my advanced classes. The grid pattern tangles don't all use only straight lines! I couldn't use Bales for example. Anyone for a hot air balloon ride?

Tangles: Demi, Gingham, Screen, Up and Across, Yincut, Zanella

Here's the one with a zigzag string and lots of curly, curvy tangles. I was going to leave a thin, white zigzag between the two halves until I realized that none of the tangles would be touching!

Tangles: Caviar, Flux, Lotus Pods, Miranda, Opus, Purslane (or Flux tangleation), Tipple, Wud

Exhibition in Saskatoon

I just finished hanging an exhibition at a local pottery shop. I'm showing nine zentangle inspired drawings, five small acrylic mandalas, and six tiny landscapes in colored pencil. To see more images of the work on display visit my web site.

The title of the drawing on the announcement is "Harmony Street". It's in black, white, and browns and I think they're all working in harmony.  :-)

"Zen Mandalas" - a new book!

Whee! I'm on a book cover!  Well, not ME exactly, but I think of my art as me and one of my Zentangle inspired mandalas is on the cover of a new book from Design Originals. There are a few more of my pieces inside.

There was a review of it (and three other new Zentangle books) on CZT Sue Jacobs blog recently. About this book she wrote:

"'Zen Mandalas' has wonderful artwork from Margaret Bremner on the cover. When I first saw it my jaw dropped!  Both Margaret and Carole Ohl contributed to this book from Suzanne McNeill. The book goes into some of the rational (sic) behind why mandalas are so special. Throughout this book there are wonderful mandalas in both black and white and color. When I showed this to people at CHA the first reaction was "I could never do that!" But when you look at one section at a time and remember the Zentangle philosophy of "anything is possible, one stroke at a time", it all falls into place.  Instructions to create you own mandala are very clear."

Yesterday I received a few copies and have now seen the book up close and personal. It's wonderful! Here's a scan of page 12 featuring two of my Zentangle inspired mandalas:

I have a few on hand and will be ordering more. If you're in my vicinity and would like a copy, phone or e-mail me.

Tile redemption

(Or, Salvage operations 2)

Doing a wee bit of organizing the other day I came across some old tiles. These were mainly from my early Zentangle days, before I'd grasped the concept of the pencil string. Interesting in their own way, many of them seemed a bit empty. I decided to re-work them and see what would happen. Here are four old tiles, Mach One and Mach Two.

EGG. Tangles in mach 2: Florz, Hurly Burly, Msst, Munchin, Opus, Rick's Paradox, Tidings, Tripoli

NEW MOON. Tangles in mach 2: Ogen, Papyrus, Seljuk, Skaylz,
not exactly Hibred, dots and some nameless patterns.

Mach 1 was a little too reminiscent of boobs. (You probably didn't see that at all, did you?)
Tangles in mach 2: Caviar, Florz, Hibred, Skaylz, Shattuck, Tripoli and dots and triangles

DAWN. Tangles in mach 2: Betweed, Coaster, Crescent Moon, Rick's Paradox, Tipple

In every case these were originally borderless. I drew a pencil border and filled in empty spaces. Here is one that I really like, but unfortunately I didn't scan the original tile. Based on adding a border and filling in, perhaps you can get an idea of what was there before.

FAIRY GARDEN (a few weeks too late!)
Tangles: Florz, Flux, Munchin, Papyrus, Skaylz

Check back through your old tiles and pull out a few less-than-favorites. See what magic you can work!

Recent ATCs

Little leftover bits of nice art paper are great to use for artist trading cards or bookmarks. Here are a few ATCs I've done lately. I don't have much chance to trade, but when the opportunity arises I'll be well stocked! These began with random scribbling with water-soluble colored pencils, a water wash that I let dry, then pens and more colored pencils.

The blue pear has a black background, which barely shows up against the other black background!