Journal Flourishes

At this time of the year I am inspired to pick up my handmade journals to make nature notes and drawings; wildflowers, landscapes, sketches of summer impressions, travel memories, etc. I wanted to share with you that this is a great opportunity to incorporate Zentangles into these special pages of journal reflections/entries. Here are a few examples of flourishes and boarders that I think you will recognize have been inspired by the Zentangle drawing method.
Try it and have fun!

Inside cover of my new "cross-structure" bound book. -

Here, the same journal with my contact information added. The inside covers are adorned with an old print I bought in Europe (1978) of Prague, depicted in the 1600s.

The top polished green leather journal is where the above flourishes reside.

From a travel journal I made for a special tour I took with the
Denver Botanic Gardens Illustrators Program in 2013.
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This illuminated, 24-karat gold embellished letter "F" is part of a travel journal, as we visited Finland. You may notice that the page is a bit distorted because the letter was drawn
on reindeer vellum (skin) that won't lye flat in the book.

Flutter By

Up here in the Colorado high country, the butterflies are out in force. Maybe that's because it's also been another stellar summer for wildflowers. As a botanical illustrator, I often incorporate butterflies, moths, and other flying pollinators in my work. So today I'll share an older print that I made and hand colored (watercolor) for a pollinators show at the Denver Botanic Gardens. This one is a moth, though often mistaken for a butterfly. Its common name is the Madagascan Sunset Moth. Since this piece was a print, I had several uncolored ones and used one to tangle around. I love the process of creating. So I'm showing you the intaglio print plain, the intaglio print painted, and the intaglio print "tangled" and painted. Actually, I also used colored pencil on this final to build the layers; so it's really a multimedia piece.

The 'tangled" Sunset Moth, tinted with watercolor, colored pencil, and a delicate wash of gold that you can't see on the screen. It makes the wings shimmer. I used a variety of Copic pen sizes for the tangles and graphite for shading.

This is the intaglio print that I used as a background for the Botangle.

The colored (watercolor) intaglio print of the above.

A trip to see my dear friend in Florida inspired me to create this piece. We visited the butterfly pavilion on a "girl's weekend" in Key West. It was magical. Thus, the key in the illustration. The background consists of bathymetric contour lines (I traced and quality controlled myself years ago at work.) Bathymetry is the topography of the ocean. I loved doing this work for the scientist who was mapping the Seychelles Islands ocean floor. I knew I'd find an artistic use for it someday! I love how the contour lines of the background make for the perfect  "string" in the Zentangle technique. Please note the use of negative space.

I also did a piece for a show at the Broomfield Butterfly Pavilion that I tinted with colored pencil. This time I tangled the inside of the butterfly.

I hope these and those gorgeous real butterflies in your area inspire you to try tangling with a similar motiv. Enjoy the summer!

April Showers Bring May Flowers

In April, I was pretty busy with my "day job" and also preparing for a couple of Botangle classes that I wanted to have a new spring templates ready for my students to use. So while it was snowing in the Rocky Mountains, I was sketching daffodils in the hopes that by doing so I could coax spring our way. So far it's still been pretty cool and wet (good news for a great wildflower season) but things are slow to bloom up here.

So enjoy this May flower now just really taking off (so late). I am posting a series of steps on how to create this Botangle so you can see how I started and ended with the final colored piece. This was done on 120-lb Arches watercolor paper. I used graphite shading under watercolor and went on top with colored pencils and white charcoal (as well as my favorite white highlighter, the Zenstone from Zentangle. It allows for more subtle whites than the white charcoal.

Now it's May and I've spent the entire weekend adding a "birdwatcher" garden for the high country in our backyard. I can't wait for those new plants to flourish and bloom, giving me much more inspiration for future Botangles!

My finished Botangle daffodils, 5.5x5.5 inches.

I began with this basic contour drawing.

Next I added shading with graphite. Here you can see that I already started adding Zentangle patterns on the stems.

More pattern work.

At this point I decided I liked keeping the inside bell of the daffodils and a few leaves "untangled" for compositional balance and interst.

Close up of the final.

I Love Bijou Tiles!

I knew that the reason I had never gotten my little square tin box of Bijou tiles from Zentangle out of my art cabinet is that I would like them too much. That's exactly what happened. These 2x2-inch squares are addictive. They tangle up so quickly and look like little jewels when finished. In just one day, I created those shown below arranged in a circle because I couldn't stop!

Recently I took them with me on a trip and ended up teaching a couple of friends to do Zentangle drawing method on them. It went fast enough that even with a couple glasses of wine and lively conversation, the new ZT students stuck with it and produced some beautiful results! This could definitely turn into a regular class or intro to another Zentangle-related project/two-part class.

Thumbs up for Bijou!

This gives you a better idea of the tile size (2x2).

The Bijou tiles are sold in this lovely and practical tin box great for changing out the display of your current favorite tile. The Bijou story is fun too.

Results from my impromptu class with Lanny and Michael at the neighborhood cafe/bar.

I showed them how easy it is to add interest to their work with my traveling watercolor materials; a Peerless book of watercolor pigments and water-fillable brush.

Michael and Lanny giving Bijou a thumbs up too.

One Last Hurrah for the Sake of Love

Since I taught two classes in February that included the heart theme, I'll post my newest "Botangle" that I developed for the class at the Denver Botanic Gardens for my last February post. Last Saturday's class was held at the beautiful historic Waring House on site and my students worked up some incredible designs. We didn't get finished with the shading and coloring so I'm only posting my sample piece; a Bleeding Heart Botangle.

I'm also showing you another coffee mug I tangled with hearts that were inspired by Maria Thomas hearts I've seen in the Zentangle Newsletter. I love the wrapping  "Umble" pattern. Unfortunately, it's impossible to shade the cup designs as they are only drawn on with Identi Pens and Sharpies in varying sizes.

I cleaned my cups thoroughly with spirits of some kind before drawing. After completing the drawing, I let them dry overnight and baked them at 400 degrees in the over for about 20 minutes to a half an hour. I must say, that's what I read on line about how to do this and they are definitely NOT dishwasher safe. I learned the hard way and lost one cup that I spent a couple of hours tangling. I've been washing my cups by hand and that seems to work fine. I am researching better ways to make these designs dishwasher durable.

I hope these heart tangles inspire you to continue to experiment with the design that speaks to our own hearts and keep love in your lives!

We LOVED Super Bowl Sunday so much that . . .

we made hearts to prove it. And the Broncos won!! Yes, though my Zentangle class at Two Hands Paperie was competing with the Broncos and the Panthers (and we're local to Denver) I was surprised that the class filled! My lovely lady students produced the most beautiful Valentine's cards - each having someone special to gift them to. Their hours of tangling and shading paid off. Here are the results.

I'm so proud of everyone's results!

The class participants minus one diehard Bronco fan
who left a little early to catch the start of the game.

Sybil's gorgeous card that she finished at home. Notice the special heart
 bead detail garnishing the flower. 

Crazy for Hearts

As Valentine's Day approaches, I've been inspired to turn my daily "zentangling" to hearts. There are endless ways to decorate that intrinsic shape and here are just a few of my spontaneous tries. Not a lot of time spent on any of them. One is nearly a copy of one of Maria's heart tangles out there on the web. It's such a great design with the wrappings around Mooka's. I love it!

I am teaching a Botangle class on hearts next weekend. Unfortunately it is in competition with the Super Bowl. The hot link "Botangle class" takes you to the site for sign up and details.