Note: Some of the inks used did not scan well. There are silver and copper dots which here, appear to be orange and white. There are a lot of differences in composition when you work on a rectangular piece, as compared to a square. However, this one works on either. The only difference is that I like it better with a horizontal emphasis. On the square version, I liked it better with a vertical emphasis.
Perhaps those pumpkins are taking on a life of their own; creating a ballet as they rise up. They leave the garden trellises behind as they creep around the Halloween garden! Another ATC. Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with Distress markers and colored pencil. Decorative elements added with various gel pens. Tangles: Crazy Nzeppel Mooka
Back to classic style! Random string with random tangles! Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil. Tangles: Claws Crazy Nzeppel Flux Nexton Pods Pokeleaf Poke Root Sez Shard
Last Monday, I wrote a post about my New Zentangle Voyagers class. This is a set of 3 classes that I am teaching at cARTel Studio. The same students are in each class. This week, the students learned about drawing on black tiles. They did a monotangle on a black Bijou tile. The second project was this Crazy Huggins, with tangles in each hug-shape. The third project was a 3-dimensional stand they can use to display a tile on their desk at work or home.
“In typography, a dingbat is an ornament, character, or spacer used in typesetting, often employed for the creation of box frames.” - Wikipedia We’ve all seen them decorating title pages, the ends of paragraphs or other areas of printed books. Zentangle, and CZT Brian Crimmins in particular, has created a tangled version of this classic concept. It is called Dingbatz, in honor of it’s typographical cousin. Here, we use the stylistic shapes and concepts of the original, but employ tangles as graphical elements.
Melting Mooka, introduced to us by Zentangle's Project Pack #6 , is a wonderful version of Mooka that can be used to as a string to divide a tile into smaller spaces. These internal sections, when filled with other tangles, result in a tile that gives the impression of stained glass windows. This was a fun, playful exercise! Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil.
One of the things that I love about the “Crazy” versions of various tangles is how forgiving they are for those who struggle with perfection. Crazy ‘Nzeppel is a perfect example. Because each section ends up being a different, and some times surprising shape, each squished bubble doesn’t have to match any other! Zentangle drawn on black, Strathmore, Artagain paper using a white, Sakura, gel pen. Shading done with Copic Markers and black colored pencil.
Army of Squirrels. This started out being a tile that was all about Crescent Moon for a FB challenge. But, when I was looking around my studio for ideas of what to do with CM, I found Aloha drawn on something. My squirrels decided that I should add that to the tile. After that, I figured all was lost… with the squirrels being in charge and just went with the flow.
Sometimes, when I don’t have a specific direction for my tangling, I just pull tangles at random. For this tile, I chose the section of the string first, and then the random tangle. I wasn’t quite sure what to do, at first, when Vega came out of the tangle jar. I’m used to drawing it as a border or a ribbon, rather than a fill. But I have to say, I might use it more often after this… I really like the results.
Hydroponics. It had been months since she had taken the ship out on a mission. But it was time. Everything in the ydroponics bay was ready. And she knew the eggs would hatch right after her arrival. The Zed’s wanted them all newborn before they would accept delivery. Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil. Tangles: Caviar Centipede Crazy N'Zeppel Deco Border Glukes Tidings Toodles
I accidentally left 3 tiles behind at the CZT Seminar. While I’m sad about that… I decided to recreate them! This one is done on a Zendala tile, but it’s not perfectly symmetrical. Working in the round isn’t something that I do very often. But I was very surprised at how relaxing this was. I think not having to make everything match from side to side takes the stress out of this type of design.
Life saver. She tossed the ring out into the ocean, not knowing if it would work. This was no ordinary water. It was a sea of freezing chemicals that a human could not survive. Even the plants (yes, there were plants in it!) were oddly floating along the surface in areas. In some places, plumes of frozen gasses erupted into the air and in others, chunks of ice floated. This was a body of water like none she had seen before!
Velvet Elvis. This odd-shaped tile is totally experimental. A couple of months ago, my older daughter came for a visit. One of the things we did while she was here involved using Oxide Distress Ink on scraps of black card stock. Besides just having fun, we were trying to see if the inks would work on black, since they contain white pigment under the dye ink. I had a couple dozen scraps of 4" x 3" paper, and we inked most of them.
Line interrupted. This tile was actually supposed to be just a practice for the full Starfish from Eni’s new Sarfish Line Interruped video lesson. However, I was having so much fun, I decided to complete the tile adding a companion baby Mooka 3d and a lightly tangled background! I liked this so much, I can hardly wait to do the actual starfish design. Want to play along? You can get this video by signing up right now for Eni’s Art Club !
This is the second of a pair of tiles for my current project . I didn’t want both tiles to match exactly, but I wanted them both to have the same theme. The pictures of these have come out a bit paler than the actual tiles. Hopefully, the pictures of the end result will show the colors better! Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a brown Pigma Micron pen.
I look at this tile and I see many things. From a layer of stones arranged as the floor of a patio to stretched out Cat’s Cradles or perhaps a section of lace. Maybe I’m looking at some sort of atomic level structure under the microscope. Who knows what it is? Crazy N’Zepple works as a fill for sections in a design or as a full design in it’s own right.
Textiles. She looked at varied shapes and textures hanging all around her in the stall. Of all the places on merchants row, this was the one that brought her the most inspiration. It was a never-ending kaleidoscope of color and patterns that constantly changed with the light. Looking for new inspiration for strings for your tiles? Grab a magazine and open it to a random page. Look at the picture on it.
Revelation. She stared up at the ceiling, trying to clear her mind. It was time to decide on a direction. Her ship was ready, but she was hesitating. This is an interesting tile, from my perspective. Those of you who have been following my art for a while, know that sometimes I create random tiles and write a few lines of a story to go with them. They are always from the perspective of a female person, one that is travling around the universes in some kind of a ship, exploring various planets.
Beauty. Even the smallest detail was graced with beauty. She was amazed at the lovely, ripe berries tucked, so carefully, within the perfect folds of the napkin at breakfast. Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil. Tangles: Bursti Crazy 'Nzeppel Phicops Poke-Root W-2
Palette. Her basket was full of magical designs just waiting to be added to a frock or a cushion. Some plain, some fancy, some simple, some complex, woven together they created a magical mixture for the customers to choose from. The basic string for this Zentangle came from the Tangler's Palette" stencils from Acadia Laser Creations on Etsy. I wanted this set of stencils as soon as I saw them.