Quotations and art - Circles

For many years my focus in art was mandalas, and - consequently - circles. I love that they are a symbol for so many things I hold important: unity, eternity, safety, wholeness, oneness. At that time I collected a lot of quotations about the circle and its symbolism.

I still create mandalas, and sometimes they show up unannounced. 

"Until we extend the circle of our compassion

to all living things, we will not, ourselves, find peace."

Albert Schweitzer

"Les Quartiers de la Ville"
Commission for individual
2007, 24" square, acrylic; ©2017 Margaret Bremner

"Everything the Power of the World does, is done in a circle. 

The sky is round and I have heard that the earth is round like a ball, and so are all the stars. The wind, in its greatest power, whirls. Birds make their nests in circles, for theirs is the same religion as ours. The sun comes forth and goes down again in a circle. The moon does the same, and both are round. Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were. The life of a man is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves. Our teepees were round like the nests of birds, and these were always set in a circle, the nation's hoop, a nest of many nests where the Great Spirit meant for us 

to hatch our children."

Black Elk, medicine man and visionary of the Oglala Sioux

"Expecting Triplets"
7"x8" mixed media, ©2017, Margaret Bremner, available

"Let your vision be world-embracing,

rather than confined to your own self."

Baha'u'llah

"Playful Planet"
10.5"x10.5" mixed media, ©2016, Margaret Bremner, sold

"A wheel was shown to me, wonderful to behold...Divinity...is like a wheel, a circle, a whole, that can neither be understood, nor divided, nor begun nor ended...no one has the power to divide this circle, to surpass it, or to limit it.” 

Hildegard of Bingen

"Wheelies"
3.5" square, mixed media, ©2016, Margaret Bremner, sold

Want more? See A few favorite quotations... (and art) here.
And Quotations and art - Ways of seeing here.

Pre-strung fun

Tangles: Bunzo, Ennies, Moon Pies, Pearlz

It's a hashtag, too! #prestrungfun. Have a look on Instagram and Zentangle's Mosaic app.

"Pre-strung" means that there are pale, gray lines provided on the paper so you have a string to start with. Zentangle(R) offers many tiles like this.

This project ("challenge"), the brainchild of three CZTs, is based on one of Zentangle's pre-strung zendala tiles, pictured below. I admit, this is not one of my favorite pre-strung strings, but I had two white ones so I thought I'd do two. Why not?

Sometimes an idea grabs my collar and whisks me away on a wild ride of creativity. Usually when I don't expect it. This was one of those times. I found myself working on one tile while ideas for another one flew at me.

Come along for the wild ride with me...

The first two I did were on white tiles. One is at the top of this post. Here's the other.
I tried using the tangle Kahla as another string, wondering what would happen if I tried to overlay two strings.

Tangles: Kahla (the overlaid string), Moon Pies,
Pearlz, Pepperish, Romanancy, Striping, Tipple, Wud

I wanted to do more! I hunted, and discovered I had some tan and black tiles with this pre-strung string. The first began with smears of copper ink from a leaky pen; the second was going to be the 'mosaic' border and something else in the middle, but you know how things go!

Tangles: Ennies, Pepperish, Printemps, Snail

Tangles: Hmmm... well, it was going to be Seljuk
but it ended up being gradations of gray Moonlight pens.

It worked well with Kahla, so on this tan tile I wanted to try using Within as an overlaid string.

Tangles: Within (the overlaid string)
Apacore, Paizel, Pearlz, Pepperish, Seljuk

Colorful ribbons wanted to play on a white tile.

Tangles: Aquafleur and Tipple

And finally, on a tan tile, sort of paisleys. And more. A lot more.

Tangles: Crescent Moon, Ennies, Purk,
Soul Star, Thumbprintz, Tipple, Within 

I understand there will be another Pre-Strung Fun event. Hope you can join in!

Have you noticed hubcaps?

I was out walking the other day and noticed an interesting hubcap. Then I noticed other hubcaps. What wonderful inspiration for mandala designs! Simply plug "hubcap photos" into an image search engine and you'll find lots of inspiration! Here are five, along with the hubcap that inspired them.

Tangles: Black Pearlz, Doodah, Fife, Hibred,
Prestwood, Skyesil, Zewm

Tangles: Dewd, Icantoo, Mazorito, Snail

Tangles: Crescent Moon, Fohbraid, Gewgle,
Tipple, Zewm

Tangles: Apacore, Cubine, and elements of
Moonwaves and Tripoli, and more.

Tangles: Black Pearlz, Prestwood, Slowpoke, and more

Phi again. PP11 follow-up

A bijou tile with Apacore centered 
at one of the four phi intersections.

Revisiting the golden mean through Project Pack 11 was such fun I wanted to do more!

The pack contains a "markus operandus" for locating the phi proportions on Zentangle tiles. Markus Operandus II can be downloaded here, for free, at the bottom of the page. I've added marks to mine so I don't have to rotate my paper in order to indicate all the phi lines. I may have it laminated. It looks like this.

It can be used not only with the new Phi tiles, but also with the classic square (also apprentice and bijou) tiles, as well as the triangular 3Z tiles. I wanted to give them a whirl. 

The proportions work on a square just as well as a rectangle. I'd done this years ago when my focus was mandalas. With the mandalas I used all four phi lines to create the working space:

Here's a mixed media painting from that time using these phi ratios.

Pro Fanis  •  ©1998
30" (76 cms) square; acrylic and collage

I've been fascinated with sacred geometry and the golden mean for many years. Delighted to revisit it in this project pack, I created a number of square tiles. 

Using the same four lines as above I did a classic-size tile. You can see Hollyhock in the corners, Icantoo in the rectangles, and the center connects it all.

Tangles: Hollyhock, Icantoo, and hints of
Crescent Moon, Pearlz, and Sanibel

I had a gray tile with a mauve wash. It struck me that somewhere near the 'center' of the flower shape might be a phi intersection. Here is the finished tile, with backwards steps to the mauve wash.

Tangles: Aquafleur, Pearlz, Pokeleaf

This is an eco-dyed tile that I subdivided into various phi-measured sections. I used Moonlight pens and gold ink as well as brown and sepia micron pens.

But triangles? The kit says it works with triangles, too. I don't see why not, but I'd never thought to try it before. On a rectangular shape, there are four phi intersections (shown above). I discovered that with a triangle, there are three.

The black and white 3Z tile below has the tangle Ayame, but instead of beginning it at the center I began at one of the intersections. On the tan tile, I used the six notches at the perimeter as places to begin the droplet shapes.

I'm grateful to Zentangle for reintroducing me to divine proportion. I plan to do a lot more with these measurements.

Creating asymmetrical mandalas

There are those who are not fans of the geometry and regularity of a classic mandala. One blog follower commented:

“I am not enamored of round Zentangles … I think it is purely that I cannot bear to do the repetition involved as well as not enjoying having to get things to work out so precisely… Too much like geometry? Too mathematical.” 

Compositional art theory knows that some repetition contributes to the unity of the whole. It could be repetition of pattern, but also color, shape, texture, technique, etc.. When I was doing larger mandalas in acrylic paint, some of that repetition became rather not fun, but for the result to be what I wanted, the repetition was necessary. Here's one of those paintings.

"Bindu Lotus" 16" diameter, acrylic paint

The repeat aspect of structured patterns is part of the zen of Zentangle, but I understand that repeating that same tangle pattern six or eight or twelve times around can become dull!

For those interested in circular work, but who balk at the repetition, I have a few ideas.

NO STRING

Choose a tangle with circular possibilities, perhaps Fengle, Auraknot, Aquafleur or LinQ. Depending on the tangle, you may choose to begin at the center or the perimeter. The tile below uses LinQ towards the periphery. You can see that the sections are uneven, and they are detailed in a variety of ways.

Tangles: Black Pearlz, Bunzo, Flux, Krli-qs, LinQ, Pearlz

LOOPED STRING

Start with an irregular, looped string. Below, while I didn't use the same tangle in all the 'petals', there is some repetition. I also used two variations of Tripoli outside the white 'petals'. Ixorus provides the many thin, white stripes.

Tangles: Black Pearlz, Ixorus, Pearlz, Tripoli,
and some things I just felt like doing at the time.

OFF-CENTER CIRCLES
Draw pencil circles as the string but do them deliberately off-center from each other. You might want to collect a few lids of different sizes for this, or draw them freehand for more irregular 'circles'. You can fill each ring with a different 'border' tangle, or whatever you feel like.

Off-center circles by Jean Chamberlain Therkauf.

Tangles: Coaster, Fohbraid, Lamar, Marasu, Paisley Boa, Wud

GROW A MANDALA

Using an organic drawing process will give you some imprecise elements. Go to this blog post, watch the video, and give it a try.

https://enthusiasticartist.blogspot.com/2012/05/how-to-grow-mandala.html

BLIND, OR NON-DOMINANT HAND

Find a simple mandala design you like and draw it with your non-dominant hand, or draw it blind if you feel more adventurous! Here's a little African bowl and the drawing I did with my left hand. Below it is the tangled zendala tile.

Tangles: Crescent Moon, Doodah, variations of Sez, Zewm, Zonked

"Winter Garden" process

This time I have a beginning, a middle, and an end photo to show you. Again I'm using the broken scarf hanger as a template for the floral mandala shape on a 10.5" Opus tile.

The beginning: a bit of Inktense for some washes of color.

The middle:

The end: there are "liquid pearls" scattered throughout, which gives the sparkly impression of falling snow. I also used a bit of metallic, glossy, and stardust inks, none of which shows in this photo!

"Autumn Garden" process

Repurposing, sort of.
I had a scarf hanger but the hanger part broke off. I liked the shapes of it and decided to use it as a template. It fit on an Opus tile!

The scarf hanger on the back of an Opus tile, 10.5" square.

I used Inktense and Aquatone pencils to do washes in the various sections:

Then I began the tangling in ink.

Ink drawing completed, copper metallic ink in a few places, colored pencil added, a lot of fine tuning, and it's done.

9th anniversary give-away!

As promised yesterday, for the 9th anniversary of my blog I'm having

An anniversary give-away!!!

1

"Revealed"

This is drawn on a blank zendala tile 

and includes a tiny sparkly gem at the center.

2

"24 Carat Mandala"
Created on one of Zentangle's pre-strung zendalas 

at the first zenAgain gathering, in 2016.

It's real 24-carat gold leaf!

3

"Moon Mandala"

Created on a pre-strung, 9-pointed, zendala tile.
At the center is a pencil drawing of a full moon.
The Glaze ink masks it somewhat in the photo.

4

"Tropical Mandala"

Created on a pre-strung, 9-pointed, zendala tile.
It includes a bit of collage and scalloped edges.
The central 'petals' are clear Stardust (sparkle) ink.

5

"Paradox Mandala"

Created on a pre-strung, 9-pointed, zendala tile.
Paradox is one of many favorite tangles.

6

"Triad Star"

Created on a pre-strung, 9-pointed, zendala tile.
A slightly angled photo to show the
white-on-white Printemps on the white points.

7

"Sunflower Mandala"

Created on a pre-strung, 9-pointed, zendala tile. 

8

"Rainbow Passage"
Lots of color!
A zenbutton in rainbow colors on a pre-strung, 9-pointed, zendala tile.
The center is black glazed and there are 27 tiny gems.

9
"Femininity Star"
Created on a pre-strung, 9-pointed, zendala tile.

A triangle with the point at the bottom
is sometimes a symbol of the feminine.

THE DETAILS

• This give-away will run for nine days, from right now until midnight (end of day) October 26. 
• You can only win one piece of art. Nothing is framed or mounted; that's up to you.
• If you win, I'll e-mail you for your postal address and pop it in the mail to you.

How can you enter the giveaway? Simple! Rafflecopter will assist.
a Rafflecopter giveaway

GOOD LUCK!