Sunday, September 29, 2013

Attempting white on black...

...with varying degrees of success. I find working in white ink on black paper very challenging.
Tangles: Chartz, Flux, Paradox, Purslane, Seljuk

Part of the challenge is the "shading" which in this case is really highlighting. It's already dark; what I need to add is lights not shadows. I find myself trying to think in reverse and then my brain hurts.

I used my initials 'MB' for a string.
Tangles: Black Pearlz (in this case, white!),
Crescent Moon, Florez, Paradox, Tipple

I tried a spiral and added a little metallic green ink.
Tangles: Coaster, Flux, Tipple

My Zenstones arrived and I couldn't wait to try those for the shading/highlighting. It's a lovely effect once blended, softer than the white pencil.
Tangles: Beadlines, Black Pearlz (in this case, white!),
Camelia, Fiore, Knightsbridge Aura, Lamar
There's something here alright. It's such an interesting effect and I enjoy the challenge. But I think I just have so much fun - and so many ideas for - working on white paper I'm not sure I'll be doing a lot of white on black. It remains to be seen.

Thursday, September 26, 2013

Knightsbridge Tipple challenge

I've missed quite a few of the DivaCZT's challenges recently. Some I would really like to have done, so maybe I'll go back to them later, especially the new tangle Well. This week's challenge is to use only Tipple and Knightsbridge. These are both favorites of mine and I teach them in my first class. I had a tile with a string already drawn using a board game leftover as a stencil. It had been hanging around for quite some time, never really appealed to me, but it seemed to invite Knightsbridge so away I went.

For more ideas about using Knightsbridge see this post. And for several variations of Tipple go here.
Just for interest's sake I thought you might like to see the string I started with, and the tile without shading.

Sunday, September 22, 2013

Fat arrows

A fat arrow is very much shaped like a simple house. This idea struck me again when I was doing the tangle Schway recently, so I tried a tile with houses in one direction and arrows in the other. I did a few horizontal pencil lines to begin, just to keep the tops and bottoms lined up.
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Bunzo, Drobbles, Flux, Paizel, Schway

Then I thought I'd add some color. And white. And a few more details.

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Spirals for the 'color' challenge

I must really like this spiral template that I've been using as a string! Here's another one, which is also my submission to the DivaCZT's challenge this week (#136) to use color. See this post for the first three.
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Bunzo, Camelia, Tripoli elements, stripes

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Tangling in Edmonton

Some months ago a plan was put in motion. Deb Kopeschny, a CZT in Toronto, is doing a low-residency Masters in Art Therapy at the University of Alberta. Kelly Weins, who lives in Edmonton and loves Zentangle, had contacted me about the possibility of going there to do some classes. Deb has stayed with Kelly, who lives walking distance from the University. See where this is going? This past weekend I drove to Edmonton to co-teach two days of Zentangle workshops with Deb! Here we are, in Kelly's garden:
Margaret, Kelly and Deb
We offered a series of four classes, each building on the previous one. People could register for as many or as few as they had time and interest for. The first class, on Saturday morning, had 18 participants. Here are the first of two tiles they did.
We taught Hollibaugh, Knightsbridge, Munchin and Tipple
Deb demonstrates Flux as the students draw along.

On Saturday afternoon we had two more sessions. These are the tiles from one class.
On this tile we taught Cubine, Marasu, Shattuck, Tidings and Yincut
Of course, everyone wanted to take photos of the tiles the group had created!

On Sunday afternoon I taught a class focusing on mandalas and 'zendalas'. First, each person followed along as I demonstrated and they created a mandala on a standard square tile. These were done entirely freehand; that really impresses me!
Not all these tangles are in each mandala: Crossview, Florz, Flux, Munchin,
Pearlz, Perfs, Rain (with Aura), and Tortuca
For the second part of the afternoon I showed them how to create a looped-string lotus form on a blank zendala tile. They used some of the tangles we'd done the day before, and I showed several new tangles. This is as far as we got in the time available. Once they have all the tangles and some shading, won't they be wonderful!?

Thursday, September 12, 2013

A Window on Zentangle

When I picked up a Zentangle tile recently, the window light was behind the paper. I noticed the shape of the little red square logo on the other side and thought it resembled a window. I traced it through to the blank side and strung a house shape around it. It only seemed right that the window frame be red! :)
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Flux, Hurly Burly, N'zeppel, Yoga, Zewm

Monday, September 9, 2013

Keys string


I was about to throw out a couple of old keys when it struck me that there was an interesting string possibility there.






I traced the two keys a few times on a zentangle tile and tangled away.
Tangles: Aura, Boss, Lamar, N'zeppel, Opus, Paisley Boa,
Pearlz, Tipple, Zedbra, Zewm

Thursday, September 5, 2013

A Soft Place...

I had a tile sitting on my desk that I used occasionally for cleaning brushes and testing pens. There seemed to be a heart shape developing at the bottom and I decided to tangle the tile. I used the edges of washes for some of the string lines, and pencil-outlined the heart shape. I call it "A Soft Place to Rest My Heart".

Now I need a new cleaning tile but maybe it, too, will develop into something interesting!
Tangles: Crescent Moon, Flux, Opus, Paisley Boa, Puffle, Tipple
"A Soft Place to Rest My Heart" (c) 2013 Margaret Bremner

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Wonky buildings

You may have noticed that I like to draw buildings - houses and onion domes in particular. Here are a few recent tiles.
Tangles: Diva Dance, Florz, Opus, Palrevo variation,
Shing, Sindoo, Rain, Tagh, and bricks
"A Warm Welcome" (c) Margaret Bremner 2013
Tangles: Firecracker, Flukes, Flux, Knightsbridge,
Lamar, Por Fin, Seljuk, Tagh, Tipple
"Door #1, Door #2, or Door #3?" (c) Margaret Bremner 2013
Tangles: Diva Dance, Meer, Posh, Tipple, Voga
"Turquoise and Roses" (c) Margaret Bremner 2013