Only Art..

It has been months since I went a whole day not doing math. I needed to take a day off even though I have so much planning to do for my summer class of algebra 2 that starts next week. 

I learned a new zentangle pattern called "Skye". I think this pattern has lots of potential for variation with all the ribbon-y twists and turns. The pattern itself didn't take me long to do, but it was the pattern, Quandry underneath that took forever! Here is the drawing before color.

I don't know what made me add color (since most of my zentangle pieces are b/w). Like I mentioned yesterday, I'm out of practice, but it feels good to doodle again.

Happy Tuesday!

Art and Mathematics - Zentangle

It's been awhile since I've posted. In fact, it's been awhile since I've created any art. So here's what I've been up to lately.  Perhaps some of you know that I went back to teaching after many years of being a stay-at-home mom. I thought I would ease into it by substituting for a math teacher who was having surgery. For a week, I taught Algebra, Geometry and Precalculus using prepared lessons, interacting with students, rediscovering how much I loved teaching. And then, the school asked me if I wanted to teach my own classes. The school needed a teacher for IB Math Standard Level. It is a two year course that covers trigonometry, statistics, and AB calculus. Were they crazy? Was I crazy enough to take the position? Of course! And so began my crazy return to teaching which has taken over my life. It's been two months and I'm finally beginning to feel like I can breathe. And it's my spring break! Though I still have plenty of things to keep me busy, I wanted to get back to doing art again.

IB stands for International Baccalaureate and without going into detail, the IB Math that I teach is a two-year course covering trigonometry, statistics and AB level calculus. One of the interesting part of this program is that students must write a paper that explores the math concepts they learned in class in real life. My seniors are working on topics ranging from statistics in sports to mathematics of Islamic geometry. And so I thought I would focus on some connections between art and mathematics this week.

If you have been following me on this blog, you know that I love zentangles. It is a stress reliever for me to just doodle some favorite patterns without worrying about what I'm creating. There have been many nights that I would simply pick up a pen and began drawing patterns in my notebook just to brain-dump so I can sleep.

Last week, my precalculus students worked on a project about graphing polar equations. You must remember graphing points and equations on a rectangular or Cartesian coordinate system.

The points are placed on the graph based on the distance away from the two reference lines called the y-axis (vertical) and the x-axis (horizontal). This is the system all of us learn in school.

There is another coordinate system that uses the distance from the reference point (the radius) and an angle from a reference direction. This system is called the polar coordinate system and is often used to graph cyclical equations. I'm not going to bore you with the details, but here are some cool polar graphs.

The last one is called an Archimedes spiral and it's what I used to graph my zentangle pattern. My original attempt on my TI-Nspire graphing calculator looked like this.

I increased the number of revolutions and also increased the step size (how often the calculator puts a point and since I increased the step size, it puts the point less frequently). This made the spiral less smooth. To get the original graph that looks like Rick's paradox, I did 80 revolutions and used a step size of 6.5. Using a simple polar equation r = Θ, I was able to create a replica of Rick's paradox. Pretty cool!

And here is an old zentangle piece I did using only Rick's paradox..

I hope do more math-inspired art this week! Stay tuned!

Tangled Reindeer

When I created my art challenge for December, I tried to be mindful of certain things...holidays, weekends, special dates. And if you have noticed, I tangle on Tuesdays because it's Tangle Tuesday on Fauxbonichi Journalers group in Facebook. And so in creating my challenge, I looked for things I could tangle. Last week, it was a snowflake and week before was an ornament. This week, it's "reindeer."

In trying to look for new patterns to use, I went to Tangle Patterns. And though I realize it's not the most efficient way to look for patterns, I sometimes will look at the scrolling patterns on top of the page and just write down patterns I like. And when I have a few I've picked out, I go to the pattern page to look for instructions.

If you recall, I have a zentangle pattern book I created to store patterns. And because I had time this morning, I was able to create pattern cards of the patterns I used today.

My youngest got to do zentangle in her art class this semester and she's become interested in tangling so I created a mini book for her to tangle. 

It's a 4.25 X 4.25 book made from card stock. There are 48 individual square sheets in the book so it should keep her busy over the winter break.

I'm also trying to create a mini pattern book for her. She could use mine, but I think she will zentangle more if she had her own portable pattern book.

How about you? Are you ready to tangle?

December Art Challenge Day 8 & 9

This has been a busy week! As the fall semester comes to an end, there are concerts, parties, exams, projects and all the holiday events! This week for us is all about Chanukah. In my last post, I painted my youngest's menorah. On Monday, I drew my other daughter's menorah.

On Tuesday, the prompt was "ornament". So I drew several, the main one being a tangled ornament using the pattern African Artist. The "gems" are very popular in the zentangle community these days so I wanted to try them.

Today, the prompt was "holiday toy". So of course I drew dreidels!

You usually play the dreidel game with chocolate gelts (chocolate coins). You start with each person placing a coin in the pot. One person spins and depending on which Hebrew letter the dreidel lands on, you win, lose, take half, or nothing happens. 

The letters nun, gimel, hay, shin now represent the phrase, "A great miracle happened there," which refers to the miracle of the oil. The story goes that a small rebel group called the Maccabes drove the oppressive Seleucids out of Jerusalem (this is more than a century after Alexander the Great). They were re-dedicating the temple to G-D and lit the menorah but only had enough oils for one night. But miraculously, the oil lasted for 8 nights. The menorah is a candlelabrum which normally has 7 candle holders. The menorah for Chanukah has 9 holders, 8 representing the miracle and one to light all the candles. I hope you enjoyed a mini-Chanukah lesson.

December Art Challenge Day 1 - Tree

Happy December! If you didn't see my last post (late last night), I created my own art/drawing challenge. Here is the challenge:

Today, I offer two trees, both using a zentangle pattern. The one above uses the pattern, Gnarly. You can see how to draw gnarly here  Gnarly is such a bold pattern and I knew it would be a b/w drawing. I love the curvature (though it was difficult to make it smooth)!

This one uses the pattern Popsicle and you can see how this is drawn here  When I saw this pattern, I knew I'd try to draw a bonsai. Unfortunate with my brown thumb, this is the only type of bonsai I can grow. 

I used my new Shinhan watercolors for this. The set came with 30 tubes of paint. And since I didn't have a palette with 30 wells, I had to get creative. So here is my solution.

I used my cheap 12-well palette and added additional wells cut from my daughter's allergy meltaways.. They are perfect! And here is my palette filled up.

If you actually count, there are 32 colors. I had to add my Daniel Smith Quinacridone Gold and Quinacridone Burnt Orange because they are fabulous on their own and great for mixing colors.

The colors are very vibrant. I'll have to really try them before I can properly review. I'm waiting on my new 24-well palette for my Holbein watercolors. Both were Black Friday purchases.. 

Happy drawing!!

Coloring Fun

I haven't used my colored pencils in awhile. And today, I felt like coloring, just for fun. I do have a few coloring books for grown ups but I decided to create my own. So I got out my compass and got to work.

I drew these on heavy copy paper so using any type of water-based media was out. So I got my Prismacolors out. I love my Prismas... they are very creamy and so blendable. And because they are so soft, the lead breaks easily when you sharpen them. So you can sharpen them with a craft knife or try this.

I had just toasted a couple of pieces of Exekiel bread so my toaster oven was warm. I lined my pan with waxed paper and placed all my prismacolors on the tray. I left them in the toaster oven for about 10 minutes while I ate my breakfast. Since the pencils have lots of wax in them, the lead softens and fuzes any breakage. When I sharpened the pencils, I only had two that broke during sharpening an the second time sharpening did not break them. So I think those two pencils had a break in them already that might have been too far apart to fuse. I will let you know if I have any more breaks..

Back to coloring..

The right "petal" has a bit of shading. I used ultramarine to shade the purple, the blue, and the green sections and even a bit on the yellow. On the red, I used Tuscan Red and Dark Umber to add depth. I also used the same two colors for the gold part. I'm not done with them but at least I write down the colors I used so I can go back.

You also don't need the expensive Prismacolors. I like Crayolas almost as much. Are you ready to color?

Here is the blank copy!

Here are two more.. The last one has lots of possible ways to combine and rearrange so make sure to print a few copies!

Please let me know if there are any issues copying these blank copies onto your computer or on your phone. And if you do color them, please send me a copy of the finished pieces! I would love to share them on a future post! 

Happy coloring!!

Go Slow To Go Fast

Happy Tuesday, which usually means Tangle Tuesday! I'm happy to say I was able to combine several drawing challenges in one sketch! Yay me! I'm finding that coming up with an idea to combine these different daily challenges is the best part of participating in these challenges. 

I needed to merge zentangle, cornucopia and illustrate the word fast. So combining zentangle and cornucopia wasn't that difficult but in order to incorporate the word fast, I had to look for a quote that would fit. And the one you see above is what came to mind.

The quote is so true when it comes to zentangle. The "zen" part comes from repetitive motion of the strokes for each pattern. And when you slow the motion down, you get into a very relaxed state and creativity flows. My youngest likes to tangle with me but often she gets frustrated because she doesn't like the result. I tell her to slow down, enjoy the process. Yeah, that goes over well with a teenager! 

And I think the quote is true for so many different aspects of life from romance, parenting, to learning new things. 

Here is a closer look at the tangled parts.

By the way, these are all patterns found in tanglepatterns.com so you should check it out!!

Inktober Day 20 - Metallic Leaves

For today's Inktober piece, I knew I wanted to start with an Inktense background of fall colors.

Originally, I was thinking of doing zendalas in silver and gold. And then I saw the Diva Challenge post this morning and I ended up drawing leaves in metallic gel pens. The quote reads, 

"Delicioud Autumn! My very soul is wedded to it. And if I were a bird, I would fly about the earth seeking the successive Autumn."

By George Elliot

And here are the leaves..

I'm afraid the only fall leaves I'll see are the ones I create! (^ ^)

Inktober Day 18 - Fly

Today I'm using only pens. I used Uniball Vision Needle to draw the feather, Pilot G-2 to shade with an aquabrush and Pntel Pocket brush pen to hand letter. 

Featherfall is the zentangle pattern I used to create the feather. I always found this pattern hard to manage. It's not a difficult pattern but I can't make it do what I want and I can never predict the outcome.  And perhaps that's the zen part of zentangle. If you would like to learn this pattern you can find the instruction here.

Or you can watch the YouTube Instruction.

Several times in my art learning process, I felt that I was on the verge of a breakthrough, whether it was learning a technique or defining my style. But something keeps holding me back, keeps me tethered to the ground. And as you might guess, what keeps me tethered is me, my own lack of confidence or my fear of the unknown and the fear of making mistakes. 

Intellectually, I know confidence comes when you learn from making mistakes, when you let go of your fears. When I was a teacher, I was known as a risk-taker, someone who embraced change, new methods, new thinking. I helped develop processes and curriculum that made learning student-centered rather than teacher directed. I was able to do this because I was able to let go of the notion that I had to know everything and be confident to go explore things for which I had no answers.

But as an artist, I feel like I'm my own worst enemy, always holding back and it frustrates me. But I keep trying, exploring, and learning from mistakes. And I hope one day, I'll be of one of those birds what breaks away from the tether.. 

Playing With Line Weight

For today's Inktober challenge, I decided to explore line weights, or how thick to thin lines are using various pens. If you have spent any time watching anime or tried to draw manga-style characters, you've seen the effect of line weights (though you may not continually be aware). Manga and anime artists use thick and thin lines to add depth and texture to their drawings. I have also seen urban sketchers like Marc Taro Holmes and Liz Steel use pens with different weights to draw gesture lines and add depth to their sketches. 

Usually when I draw, I use a single pen. I tend to use color and other media to add depth and texture. 

My favorite pen to use is the Platinum Carbon Pen. It is super fine and is very durable. It can also be used over gesso which is nice. And it is relatively cheap. The ink is waterproof so you can watercolor over it.

My next favorite are Preppy Pens in .02 and .03 widths. The ink that comes with these pens are NOT waterproof but the Platinum carbon ink cartridges will fit in them, Score! I love Microns too but I'm so rough with my pens that I tend to ruin then too quickly.

Recently I purchased the Pentel Pocket Brush Pen for hand lettering. Brush pens require lots of practice to get the thick and thins to work together, and I'm practicing! It is also waterproof so it works well with watercolor a too. 

For today's Inktober entry, I went with mandalas and tried to use different pens to create them. Mandalas and zentangle are wonderful to create complicated-looking patterns that are fairly easy to create. And I've always used a single pen to create them and added pencil shading to create depth. This was an interesting exercise for me to think about which pens to use. And though the differences in weight among my fountain pens are slight, the lines created by them give the drawing some depth.

Undulating Tangles

For this week's Diva's Challenge, guest host, Sharla Hicks, challenged us to create undulating S and C tangles. There are so many patterns that lend themselves to this, but the image that popped into my mind was what you see above. Nipa with Cruffles for circles. I like the dimentionality of Nipa as it reminds me of wavy sands and Cruffles are always fun!

When I finished, I looked through my tangle patterns book and saw the pattern Twenty-one, another favorite! I think if you shade this, you get an undulating movement.

I think I may spend the day exploring more undulating patterns! Have a great day!

Something Different

In this week's Diva's Challenge, the guest blogger, Erin Olsen, has a fun challenge! I've always loved mandalas and zendalas but was intimidated to create ones from scratch. But Erin has provided us with a template! The template as well as other examples of this week's challenge from all over the world can be found here! 

For mine, I started with festune in all the circles and purk in the "eye" shapes. The rest were filled with auras (means to follow around or within a shape).

I hope you give zentangle a try. It's totally addictive, very relaxing, and anyone can do it!

My First Diva's Challenge

This is my first entry in the Diva's Zentangle Challenge. In this Challenge (#217), we were to use the patterns Dex and Bunzo. My original thought was to create a tunnel-like structure with Dex and have Bunzo snaking through the center. The tangelation required to do that was too much work, so I took the easy route, which was to flatten the overall structure.

Bunzo is always a fun pattern. I had to make myself stop before it overtook the whole paper. I hope I will be able to participate weekly. 😊

Take a look at how other participants used these patterns here.

Have a great day!

April Tangles

Every Tuesday, I participate in a Facebook group called Doodle Tuesday where you post your doodles.  There are several of us who really enjoy Zentangle so one of the members created a weekly challenge that involves three patterns and sometimes a color. The picture above was our first challenge for the month.  For those interested, the patterns were paizel, fassett, and jawz.  And to all who think you cannot draw these patterns (Deedles, I'm thinking of you), you absolutely can!  Instructions for drawing these patterns are found here.  The beauty of these patterns is that they look complex, but they really aren't and when you combine patterns, they give you rich, interesting piece of art.

The second challenge involved the patterns quib, in a pod, and spawn. This one took me awhile to figure out how to combine the patterns.

I wasn't quite happy with my finished one, not quite sure why.

In the third challenge I used maisie, garlic clove, and organza. This one was fun to do. The patterns flowed and I could feel myself getting into a zen-like trance as I penned the repeated strokes. 

And here is the final one for the month. I used akoya, undling, and X. Who names these? I hope you give zentangle a try. It takes a bit of practice, but you can produce stunning images!

I really enjoy these challenges. If you are on Facebook, you can request to join the group Doodle Tuesday.

Hope you have a creative day!