1st-3rd of April and Elatorium challenges

I am not often talking about weather. But during Eastern we have had days with bright warming sunshine and cold nights. The snow is now melting daytime and freezing by night. A promise about spring is in the air though we can walk on the hard surface of the snow covering the fields around here. I can see how this has affected my latest page in the calendar! I used Paradox as a string as well as a pattern, inspired by Margaret Bremner´s illustration for this month. Peace Petals (Sandy Kelley Jones) is the promise of spring coming. Then Crusade (Wayne Harlow) and Trisade-fragment (Tangleation of Crusade by Staub Korn) are breaking Ice and Shattuck is also coming with the springthing.

When I see my patterns used in challenges and/or by other tanglers I get so excited. I appreciate it very much, it is like connections with others get visible. I just love it. 2 challenges recently has been with my patterns Ezpei and Lenche. These are found in ELATORIUM at Fb. The first one was Ezpei together with Ruutz (Eni Oken) and Garlic Cloves (Jacquelien Bredenoord). You find it here. My entrance is made on a recycled watercolorpainting.

So satisfying to make something on old watercolor I don´t want to see any more!

Next challenge with Lenche, Wall Break (Tina Kirchhübel) and Olspin (YuRu Chen) you find here.

And here is mine:

Wall Break I first tried when Tina published the steps on Flickr and I did like it a lot so I was so happy Ela choose this pattern together with Lenche! Olspin was new to me but I like the playfulness of this one and I will get back to it for sure. Thank´s Ela for doing this! You also find the challenges at Elatorium were you also find the wonderful resourse Musterquelle!

Daily tangles and I am the Diva´s challenge 353.

There are many techniques to learn in Zentangle-world. Recently Rick and Maria posted a video in the Zentangle-app, demonstrating something they call Wholly Hollibaugh. It is fun to do and easy to learn. I practiced it a few times on little Bijou and here I made it on regular tile 8,9x8,9 cm:

It is like cutting wholes in a pattern to be able to watch what is going on underneath! I used Hollibaugh and Pixioze (Margaret Bremner) for this one, after watching Melinda Barlow´s video. I like to tangle in a round!

Rick and Maria explores this technique aplying it on a couple of tangles so I wanted to give Elven (Elena Hadzijaneva) a try. I also used And (Sandra Harsveld) and Printemps. I am happy the way it turned out and I did enjoy the process.

Next one is a Heart-Zendala for the Diva´s weekly challenge. I hesitated doing this. I think I have had enough of hearts by now. But I searched for a template and found one on pinterest. Since I don´t have any prestrung zendalas this was my option if I didn´t want to create a heartstring myself. It works pretty good to do it like this! Here is my zendala for the Diva:

The patterns: Tipple, Paradox, Hibered and 5C (Ina Sonnenmoser). I am glad I did this challenge after all. It was relaxing and I am satisfied with the outcome. Using a template is very much the same as using a prestrung zendala and there are a lot of them to be found on the internet!

7th-9th of February and Diva´s Challenge 350

A couple of days ago, Sandy Kelley-Jones posted a page from her calendar where she put Crescent moon in all corners and used a focustangle each day. I wanted to try this because the idea was so simple yet so interesting. It is possible to get into a zen-zone immediately doing it this way! The focus, the centre. I had to try it and I must say this was very satisfying! I also choose Crescent Moon in my corners ans focused on Arukas, Flukes and Tipple. This way to tangle will go straight to my toolbox!

I am the Diva´s challenge this week is UMT = use my tangle. Rimana by Nadine Roller. Here is my tile:

One more heart to tangle! I added some Tipple but the rest is for Rimana! This pretty little pattern may be more useful than it first seemed to be! I liked to do it!

Back to Rumpus

In December, Maria and Rick released a new tangle, Rumpus. I haven´t done much about it since then, but now Laura Harms has it in the weekly challenge #349. As Maria draws it she used color. But if a tangle will get into my own library of tangles that I will use it is necessary to get it work in blackandwhite! Otherwise it will be a pattern among others that just passes my way. So for this challenge I saw my chance:

Here it is with some striping and `NZeppel in the background! I loved to see the result coming out like this, because drawing Rumpus is in itself very meditative, with basic, repetitive strokes. I think Rumpus has moved into my tangle-library by now!

28th-31st of January

Last days of January I have been exploring tangleations of Paradox. 

Carole Ohls tangleation Bumpadox seemed so cool and fun I had to try it. Then I went to Margaret Bremner´s blog, "The enthusiastic artist" and found her interpretations on Paradox which led me to the "Feathered Paradox". So I played around too...

For the last day of January I started with a little Caviar (Lori Howe) in the Center, then they all came as follows: Florz, Wud (Joni Feddersen), Crescent moon and Fescu. It looks like a button this one I think. 

Duo-colored surface and rescue tile part 2

One more round to gowith the duo-colored surface, since there was one more tile left out of the first one! Here it is:

I realize I should have taken a before-pic before I cut the tile in parts with the tan tile. I didn´t. If the first one was fun to do, this one was even more! I used Fragment Y4 (from Zentangle Primer; very useful fragment), Eye-Wa (Zt), Florz(Zt) and Knightsbridge (Zt). It is so satisfying to rescue tiles and give them a new life! I also put the two tiles together to see if something happened here:

And yes they can match eachother. Not a perfect match maybe, but good enough! This is a wonderful technique, learned from the Project Pac 2, which was a part of #12DaysofZentangle! I´ll find out a way to use this working with my other collages.

Duo-colored surface and rescued tile.

 Ever since I did the 12 Days of Zentangle, Day 9 I have been thinking of trying the technique on a 8,9x8,9 tile. I saw Sandy Kelley Jones do it, using a tile she hade left just started and I thought I could use it to rescue a tile that went "wrong" from the start. Although I know there are no misstakes in Zentangle I have a small pile of tiles I abandoned since they didn´t go my way from the start. These tiles are a resource belive me! I never know where they will go as I start them over again! My first try on Eye-Wa, a Zentangle original pattern, didn´t go the way I wanted so I laid it in that abandoned pile. As I grabbed it this time, I also picked a tan tile and my scissors. 

And now here it comes transformed to something completely different:

But I wasn´t to happy about it, the tan part needed something more to get more contrast, so I went on like this:

I redrew  the Pookeroot in black, and that small difference made it I think! Except Eye-Wa and Pookeroot there is a bit of Florz too. Now I am finished and happy with my Rescued Tile!

The Diva´s challenge no. 347

This time Laura Harms asked us to just grab something and use it for a string (tracing it). So I found a roll of scotch in a holder fitting on my tile. Here it is:

I had some fun using Lori Byerly´s patterns: Gr8, Paki and Mashed. Then I had to try some tranzending on it too. I loved to do this challenge, since I feel a little stuck doing my strings in the same style all the time! Thank´s Laura, this was perfect match with me right now!

4th-6th of January 2018

There are many things to explore about tangling. And so many patterns around!! I can´t take them all in I know that. Because of this knowledge I might close my door to new opportunities, I am aware of this. So the last three days I have challenged myself to take part of one challenge a day from ElaToRium. I do it in my calendar, not knowing what to come and not knowing how long I will do this. Maybe it ends with one page? Still can´t tell. Here is my first page anyhow:

It is a little scary. Of nine patterns the last three days, there are only two I have tried before; Breach (YuRuChen) and X-mas Red (Lin Chiu). The others; Alps (Linda Rea), Zanella (Sandra Strait), Loave it(Jane Monk), Hay Ho (Ksenija Vojisavlejevic), Swirl and Twist (Linda Rea), Sleutel (Dörte Seupel-Kör) and Netzwerk (Simone Bischoff) were all new to me. When I came to the daily challenge on the 6th, I was in trouble! The trouble was caused by Netzwerk. How on earth could I make something out of this? Lines everywhere and where to go? And how to make it work with the others? Well it ended up like it did. First I used it as a background to X-mas Red but I felt I didn´t make it justice so I went for it again between the numbers 5 and 6. This little part gave me more satisfaction, but I belive that Netzwerk will be resting for some time before I try it again.  I can see there are possible ways to go with it though I think I am not there yet.

I know that zentangle is not about knowing  all the patterns around. Not at all. But what I try to experience is what happens as I expose myself to new unknown patterns and try to see what I could do with them. Most of the time I choose my patterns myself, but doing like this someone else has choosen and most often not choosen the patterns I know of. Lets see what will happen doing this... 

Apprentice tile

12 Days of Zentangle goes on and a lot of inspiration follows! I think I have not mentioned Apprentice tile?! It is a little bit larger: 11,4 x 11,4 cm. The common tile is 8,9 x 8,9cm. On Day Four Rick use the Aprentice tile and since I cut my white tiles myself from a sheet of Fabriano Tiepolo paper (same as in regular tiles), I easily cut me a couple of Apprentice tiles, just to experience the difference. Original Apprentice tiles are cut from a Bristol-paper though.

I used Pigma Micron 0,3 to get closer to the same pen Rick used in the video. It was fun to do this and I had no trouble at all using a larger space. Doing the Diva Dance with Sproings as it was demonstrated was fun and very relaxing. I had to tell myself to STOP, it just went on and on and on! 

I also realized that Apprentice tiles are prefect for not only young beginners but also for adults and not only for beginners! It offers a larger space (sometimes that is very refreshing), which might be easier to handle if your eyes don´t function as they should do or if you have trouble with fine motor abilities! The effect of the 0,3 pen on this size is comparable to the 0,1 on 8,9 x 8,9 cm !  

10th-15th of December and 12 Day´s for Christmas.

One of those things, I don´t have much time for in December is posting in this blog, or being present in social media. That´s the way it is. I try to make my christmas-cards, and allow myself to prepare things I like to do for christmas. But my calendar is on the priority-list as well as be sure I have a moment for meditation every day. 

10-11th, I went for Flux. Flux is a flowing tangle and can go on forever! This was inspired by Molly Hollibaugh´s day two in the 12 Day´s of Christmas.

13th of December is important here in Sweden. We celebrate Lucia from Siracuse. This time of year we need some enlightning in the darkness, the sun doesn´t shine too long during the daytime so Lucia coming whit candles in her hair is popular in more than one way. I felt for star-shaped tangles and started with Afterglo (Carole Ohl, Auraknot (Zt) and X (Lila Popcheff). The stars are accompanied by Striping, Pokeroot, Pokeleaf and Echoism, all (Zt). A little glimpse of blue...

12 Days of Christmas from Zentangle consists of one video a day, starting on 12th of December and is very inspiring. I intend to try them all but in my own pace and own order. Don´t know if I succeed..

Here is my tile for Day One, using Crescent moon, Hollibaugh, Printemps, Bales and Sprinkle. Sometimes it is so good visiting some basics as the Z-string and early learned tangles just trying to do something new with them!

Then I jumped to Day three:

Maria demonstrated her new tangle Rumpus. I followed her instructions to experience this tangle from the start. It was a meditative moment today, doing it like this on a white Zendala and Rumpus will stay in my library of tangles for sure! I love the repetitive strokes, and the possibilities I can imagine for this tangle!

4th-9th of December

I do like my plan to make friends with patterns in December!

4th-6th I spent time whit Phicops (Laura Harms and Brad Harms) and Swarm (Zt). A little Fescu also grow n the 6th. I did improve specially with Phicops, a beautiful tangle.

The last three days I spent with Pea-nuckle (Molly Hollibaugh). I like Pea-nuckle a lot, but I need to work on it to find the flow! Some Swarm and Phicops still wants to participate!

28th-30th of November

This was all for November and #Giveatangle2017!  Patterns: Drupe, Chain Link (Barbara Finwall), Amphora (Lily MOon) and Batumber (Kelley Kelly).  Yes, I tried some tranzending on Drupe!

Striping on a black zendala and calendarpage 25th-27th of November.

In PP01 there was a video with striping on a black presprung zendala. As I didn´t have a presprung black zendala I searched the web and found a template I wanted to try. Here is what I decided to try. I printed the template, used my white charcoalpencil on the back of the paper, placed it on my zendala and traced the lines and so there I had a "presprung" zendala! I don´t use templates very often but for this purpose I thought it would work ok.  This is the first time I made a monotangle on a zendala and I must say it was the perfect thing to do on a presprung one! I do enjoy the process  working on a zendala very much. So: More zendala in my life is a promise to myself. 

Here is the calendarpage:

Viaduct (Wayne Harlow), Cubine, Beeline and Drupe. A strange combination I thought. Especially to get some Drupe on 27th to be done! But however it came out and I do love this page more than I thought I would. Cubine is a favourite of mine for sure but I wouldn´t have chosen these combinations if I hadn´t followed the #Giveatangle2017 -prompts! So glad I did. 

Tangling in a round

Today I remembered something important. Tangling in a round is special. It is hard to explaing why, but at once started the focus is there. 

I love to do this very much. It is relaxing and very meditative. I went out on the internet looking for thoughts about this and ofcourse I ran into Mandalas. I don´t want to use rulers nor templates which seems to be the common way, at least on the internet. Happily I found a blogpost made by Margaret Bremner, which I think nailed important things about mandala. She writes: "The circle is one of very few virtually universal symbols throughout history and across cultures, representing eternity, wholeness, protection and unity. The mandala is symbolic of balance, transformation and the interconnection of all things." Of course this is not new, but it is good to keep in mind.

About this tile: I used Zailz (Loretta West) and Lisbon Fragment (Henrike Bratz) with string 77 (Barbara Finwall). Starting with the circle lightly penciled on a 8,9x8,9 cm white tile then just going for the tangles. So simple, so relaxing, so meditative. 

Calendar 22nd-24th of November and the Diva´s challenge 342

Margaret Mc Kerihan´s Ta-Da is a favourite of mine though it was some time since I used it. Thank´s to #Giveatangle2017 I found it again! Some small Fengles also joined and then came Phroz (Lynn Shelton Mead) and Viaduct (Wayne Harlow).

I am the Diva´s challenge no 342 is about making a duotangle using Paradox and Bunzo. Paradox is one of those I want to make friends with. The pattern looks complicated, but as Laura Harms says: It isn´t complicated to draw. I don´t use it very often though I find it relaxing and flowing easily. It is something else. I find it difficult to make variations on. If I try to, I am not so pleased with the result. It is like Paradox is so perfect by itself... But I like to let Bunzo play with it. It kind of soften the sharpness in Paradox. I made it on black tile today and here it is:

Bunzo is a kind of wild striping and I like that a lot. Like there are something organic inside it waiting to come out!

Calendar 19th-21th of November and Crescent moon

One thing I like about the calendar is that you never know what the next page will be like! I am surprised about how Flourish turned out and also about Fengle.  Bales is also something that surprised med. The variation in the middle is inspired by Martha Huggins video. To me this variation is the same as Puf (Carole Ohl) I didn´t realize it actually is the same tangle! I will use it further on thinking of it as Puffed Bales!!

And now the next video from Zentangle! Crescent moon on black tile! It was so fun to draw this!

If you haven´t already watched the video, I recommend you to do it!

Bookmarks from Ela

In beginning of September I got som happy surprises from Ela Rieger. Among others three untangled bookmarks. They had such beautiful surfaces, I had to wait and see how to treat them. But then Dewd showed up! That pattern wanted to take place on these! 

The bookmarks has another side too in other colors. So I made some more tangling there:

The yellow one to the right was the hardest one for me to tangle on.  I think I am more a red or a purple person than yellow....  But I am very pleased with the process and I do love the Dewd on the light green surface a lot! In the middle is my first try on Meshmerize (Tòmas Padrós).

Reflections on "Non-representational"

As I ran into Zentangle method, one of the first things I heard of was that Zentangle was non-representational. To me that means Abstract. It isn´t made to look like anything. I was attracted by this idea, since that was very close to my thoughts about my own art. Of course I can draw a cat and then tangle on it. But as I do that I immediately jump into planning. Another aspect of this is  that the cat has a top and a bottom. Zentangle hasn´t. Nothing prevents me from doing tangles on a cat just for fun but the only thing this way of drawing has in common with the zentanglemethod is the structured patterns.

Today I made a happy tangling, doing an exercise from Zentangle Primer using Shattuck, Jetties and Bales. Couldn´t resist to make the tangleation of Bales I learned from Martha Huggins.  Here it is:

Jetties is a pattern consisting of orbs. Could be balls in the eyes of the observer and if so it could be representational. But the meaning of non-representational is something else. Abstract doesn´t mean there are no recognizable objects. The picture as whole is abstract and there is no intention to make it in an other direction. Maybe this Shattuck may look like a fence? If the observer think it is, than it is ok, but there is no intention to make a fence, the interpretation is in the observers eye.

In abstract art you find a lot of symbols, well known or only known by the artist. Patterns are used in symbolic ways. In zentangle this also happens, but it is always unpredictable, since there is no planning. Even if this was an exercise, I didn´t plan the outcome, but I decided to use these patterns as suggested in the exercise.

This tile is special in another way. Tanglers are using "chops" to sign their tiles. Till now I have used the signature I use on my paintings. But today I knew what my chop should look like! It took some time, but here it was!

Another example of non-representational drawing:

I tangled the cover of the notebook I got from my granddaughter a couple of days ago. Tangles used: Showgirl (Vicki Bassett) and Well Well (Zt). Looking at it I could make an interpretation and speak about whirling feathers or something else, but it still is non-representational.

I love the possibilities non-representational pictures, abstract pictures gives to me: It can be anything and I never get tired of looking at them. And I never get tired of making them, since the focus is mainly on the process and the process is so liberating!

Striping with a Twist

As Margaret Bremner made her "Striping with a twist" she brought the tanglepattern "Striping" (official pattern from the Zentangle headquarter) to a new level. Many of us wanted to try this and so did I. Now this is the focustangle in Square One. Striping with a Twist. As a tangler you want to add something personal when tangling. Striping is one of those patterns I find difficult to add a personal Twist. It doesn´t bother me though, I use the Striping now and then and love it. But to take over another tanglers personal twist is even harder I think, without just being a copycat! This time I made it on a Rennaisance-tile:

The other patterns used are Sez (Zt) and Pixiose (Margaret Bremner). I also tried to practice some Tranzending on this. Somehow it just happened. I didn´t care about the outcome, I just enjoyed the process (which I am not sure I did when I tried Striping with a twist last time)and to be in the "zone". All of a sudden I had a great time, and fun too!