Floral Zendala

When I started this week's zendala dare, flowers were not on my mind.  Yet, that is where I ended up.  A few dares back, I used Hi-C's in the center of my zendala and wanted to use it again.  To me, when Hi-C's is turned outward rather than inward, it looks like a lily.  Now that I have this big lily in the center, I wanted to keep up with flowers and nature.

I used a variation of Versa and opted to fill in the space because I was in the mood for some black.  The other side is Fife.  I wanted there to still be black behind the pattern, but I wanted some contrast to the Versa.  Around the boarder is my variation on Chainlea by Norma Burnell.  When I get a moment, I'll step it out for anyone who may like to see it.  I couldn't think of a pattern that I wanted to use in the open spaces so I took that as a sign that I should leave it as is.

This post is short as my boys keep coming in here to see if I'm finished with the computer yet.  Plus, I need to get working on this week's Diva challenge also brought to us by the wonderful Erin.

Have a great day and thanks so much for stopping by!

Sepia Zendala

Last year, I did an art exchange with some on-line friends.  It was a lot of fun.  I was just getting into Zentangle and made tiles for each of the people that I sent stuff too.  In return, they sent things that they made back to me.  One sent a knittted hat and beautiful jewlery that she made, another sent the most adorable knitted cupcakes (which my 5 year old promptly claimed for himself.)  Since I enjoyed it so much, I proposed to do it again this year. 

I had four takers interested in doing a "creative swap" with me.  As I only had four takers, I figured that I could really have fun and make some larger zentangle inspired pieces.  My skills are better than they were a year ago (I hope.) and I saw this as a chance to give back something beautiful to friends who had sent me such wonderful things.

Mandalas and Zendalas have really been inspiring to me as of late.  I created one for an auction at my son's school and wanted to keep going.  Once again, I started with mandala design that I traced out on to watercolor paper.  My geometry skills are at a solid F so I have to rely on a shape created by someone else.  Wanting to keep with the Indian feel of the mandala, I chose to draw in sepia.  I used the micron speia pens in a 01, 05 and 1 sizes.  I did most of the drawing with the 01 and used the others for fill in and where I wanted a thicker line.

Mostly done here. Just needs some shading and a few highlights.

It took me about 3 weeks to get it all done.  In that time though, there were days when I didn't work on it at all and other days that I drew most of the day.  I finally got it all finished this morning and I am soo pleased with the finished product.  I am tempted to keep it and hang it on my own wall. 



All shaded

 As I was working, I was afraid that the many different patterns would make it too busy.  Often I want to fill in each section with something different.  Once I started shading though, the different sections started to pop out and pull back into their own spaces giving them enough seperation that I think it works.

The final size is roughly 7" and will be framed in a 12X12 frame with a 8X8" opening.

Biggify

This week the challenge from The Diva was to make our tangle patterns larger than we usually do.  I had been thinking of this very thing for a little while.  I really love the tangle Tripoli yet when I go back to add embellishments to my triangles, I think that sometimes they become muddled.  I seem to be afraid to made a bigger design though.  Why?  Who knows.  It was nice to get "permission" this week to stretch out the patterns and to give them the room to grow.

Funnily enough, I didn't use Tripoli in my tile. I started with Rain.  I like the graphic quality of it and as I have just started to use it, I wanted to explore it more.  I chose Fife because I need more practice with it.  Making it large makes it easier for me to create it.  Bigger gives a lot of negative space behind the pattern which almost begs for more pattern there but I stopped and just shaded.  I thought about blacking the background but I was afraid that I would lose Rain.  I next tried SOCC.  This is a new pattern and is quite striking I think.  I am really looking forward to using it more in the future.  Lastly, I added Umble.  I love it's curves.

I will try to work a little bigger in the future.  I confess I get stuck with the same size patterns and to break that pattern will be a challenge but a fun one.  Bigger will be fun when it comes to adding layers of tangles to a tile or ZIA, and I look forward to the challenge.

Red Thread

This week, Cris Letournea, CZT at Tangled Up in Art is guest hosting the challenge from The Diva. Please click the link to find out more about The Red Thread Promise.  It sounds like a great cause.  I will be happy to donate my tile.

I'm afraid this post will be short.  In the run up to Thanksgiving, my time and energy are short and I fear that if I don't post now I won't get to it.  So with out further delay, my Red Thread tile.

I hope that those celebrating have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.  For anyone who isn't, I hope that you have a wonderful week.