Friday, February 26, 2016

Zentangle Inspired Art (ZIA) 11" X 14" on black

I have my classroom in my basement and after our water problem a couple of weeks ago, it gave me the opportunity to make some changes.  Clean things up, add things, etc. I like to have a wide variety of zentangle inspired art on the walls for my students to see and hopefully, be inspired by.  After one of the recent DIVA challenges of taking a tile you did years ago and redoing it with your skills of today, I decided I needed to do that with some of my old art work too.  I had a piece in my basement bathroom from 2010 and I could see that it needed updating. 

It's also nice to have examples of art for all the classes I teach.  I have a 8 sized cube of white on black tiles, but decided I needed something bigger.  I also wanted to add some new color and techniques to it.  The piece I was replacing was 11" X 14".  So I purchased a large piece of Canson Mi-teintes paper and cut it down to size.  I started with the tangle, Molygon toward the center of the paper with a Sakura White gelly roll pen.  Then I just started tangling, nothing planned, and using whatever tangles came to mind, of course some of my favorites!  I alternated between the white pen and a Sakura Metallic Gold gelly roll pen.  I have seen some really pretty color done on black recently, so I gave it a shot and added two shades of blue Prismacolor pencils to the Molygon (both the white and gold).  *Tip: When adding color pencils to black paper, put down a layer of white pencil first. Then I thought it needed some touches of blue in other tangles, so I added a little for balance. I shaded with a white charcoal pencil and a zenstone.  I also added just a little shading in some of the gold tangles with a gold metallic Prismacolor pencil.  To complete it, I took a Sakura Stardust (clear) pen and added just a touch of that to some of the tangles for some sparkle (I love that pen!). 

I mounted it in the mat and frame I had, and now I am going to hang it in my studio because I am really happy with how it turned out!  That means I need to do another piece for the bathroom wall which I originally intented on replacing.  Not a problem for me, I love working larger on ZIA's!

*NOTE:  I always tell my students to remember the Zentangle method of art is more about the process then the product, and you can let your zentangle practice take you wherever you want.  If you only like doing tile size art, that's perfectly fine!  If you are inspired to do larger ZIA pieces, that's fine too.  Do what you enjoy and is right for you




Wednesday, February 24, 2016

DIVA Challenge #256 Duo Tangle: BooKee & Artoo

This week the challenge from the DIVA is to use two of her tangles; BooKee and Artoo.  Both of them named after her boys.  I like both of these tangles and kept my tile simple with just those two tangles.  Wishing all of you a good week! 

Friday, February 19, 2016

DIVA Challenge #255 Ghosts of Tangles Past

What a fun challenge this week at the DIVA's!  Our challenge is to take a tile from your past and recreate it with your tangling skills of today.  I have a box of tiles from when I first started tangling, before I became a CZT.  It was kind of fun to go back and look at them now.  Some I even had a really good laugh at!  This is one I remember being kind of proud of back then and I can see that my style is more bold now and with better shading. It makes me wonder if I revisit this new one in 5+ years, will my style change even more, hmmm?  



Tile on left done 5/10/2010 and tile on right done 2/18/2016
 


Friday, February 12, 2016

DIVA Challenge #254 Valentangle

The DIVA's challenge this week is to create a tile with a Valentine theme.  This has been a couple of busy weeks for me....two 1 yr old birthday parties (one still to come tomorrow), a wedding and babysitting.  I have been busy making things for all these occasions, which I will post next week!  All so much fun!  Love has definitely been in the air here!
I will be honest, this may be one of the few tiles I did in 15 minutes....grabbed some metallic pens and here you go.  Happy Valentine's Day, everyone


Wednesday, February 3, 2016

DIVA Challenge #253 Molygon

Our challenge from the DIVA is to try the new official tangle, Molygon.  I love this new tangle and the way it just moves along the tile in lots of different directions.  I kept it simple and just did a monotangle of Molygon.  I used stippling for shading and a light gray marker in between some of the shapes.