Sensuous Zentangle

Weekly Challenge #231 Guest Post by Sharla Hicks, CZT

Weekly Challenge #231: "The Undulating Tangles in C and S minor"

What senses are activated when you read the word undulating. What do you hear, see and feel when using the word undulating? Does it evoke images of soft swaying movement dancing to music, does it evoke a sense of rolling hills, or gentle waves on your favorite lake? For me undulating evokes positive warm emotions that help me feel relaxed and peaceful and I actually feel myself begin to sway. . . .

My challenge to you this week is to use an old favorite undulating C or S curve tangle and work in a series OR find a new one and begin a new series.

• I encourage you to work in a series by returning to an undulating Tangle you have not visited in a while as a revisit often opens new channels of mindful creative thinking.
• My question is did your tangle take on a life of its own beyond that of the original tangle as an expression of your style?

"Sensuous On"

The tangles are all based on "C" or "S" and some are fairly new (still trying to master) and some are old favorites.  The other "S" I used is "shading."

Please leave comments.  Thanks.

Weekly Challenge #228: GUEST BLOGGER Cari Sultanik, CZT

Weekly Challenge #228: GUEST BLOGGER Cari Sultanik, CZT

The dog days of summer are long and hot here on the east coast of the U.S., but there is so much to celebrate this time of year. Beautiful big shade trees, swimming pools and beachside fun, summer flowers, and (for the kids in most areas), no drudgery to take away from blissful hours of outside carefree fun. My kids are lucky enough to go to summer camp--one as a lifeguard, the other in his last year as a camper--and I am delighted that they can have an experience they can carry with them for a lifetime. 

Of course, in other parts of the world (looking at you, Australia) it's winter, some of us work in air-conditioned (thank goodness!) offices with little access to nature's bounty, and some of us flat out hate the heat and humidity. 

Whether you're outdoors-obsessed or indoors-indignant, you can enjoy THIS challenge which celebrates all things natural and organic. I've always been drawn to tangles that imitate nature, even though Zentangle is, of course, meant to be non-representational. I simply like the curved lines, the impression that tangles that "grow" make that bring tiles or ZIA pieces to life, and the colors that can be brought into the artwork that evoke feelings of joy and wonder. 

Somehow, the summer is passing me by without my going outside to enjoy it.  This challenge inspired me to head for our local state park and a refreshing dip in Cayuga Lake, with a lovely rest looking at the sky, trees, people, and listening to Jeff Sharra's Wave of Steel.  Do, thanks for getting me outside to enjoy the lake.

I did two tiles in response to the challenge.

Submarine

I dream of the ocean.   I wanted to be a marine biologist.  I missed my calling.  Now I pull the dream from my mine to paper.

Summertime Dream

A floral fantasy using some of my favorite zentangle.

Weekly Challenge #227: Circus Life

Challenge: Circus Life

This is this week's challenge:

Hello to all the Diva challenge followers! I am Lee Darter CZT #15. The Diva was at my training seminar as the key note speaker and I was so inspired by her story. I have been tangling for 8 years. I took my first workshop with Suzanne McNeill in Texas 2008. I was hooked, it was like the mother ship calling me home. I felt the same way when I got certified. It is an amazing experience to be around so much talent. I did not want to leave. 

My challenge is based on our annual family beach trip to Florida where we have a house. We will be on Anna Maria Island near the summer home of the Ringling Brothers winter home and museum in Sarasota. 

What do you think of when you think of the circus?

I think of fun, striped tents and lots of action and movement.  

For my guest challenge, create a tile using the tangles Cack by  Adele Bruno and Tropicana by Kate Ahrens. 

Then just just like a 3 ring circus - chose from either Florz, Linq by Lara Williams or Fescu to add a third element to your design. 

Circus Finale

The last night of the circus before it packs up and moves on.  A bird's-eye view of a fireworks show, as the audience looks upward to the exploding, glittering, flashing display over the safety net in the center ring.

I am rarely this literal, and I believe I overthought this week's challenge.  I had never used either Cack or Tropicana, and so had to learn them first, and I did not feel inspired by them.   And the challenge to consider what I think about when I think abou the circus led to the insight that the circus culturally is always some sort of metaphor.  And that led me to recall a favorite poem by Archibald MacLeish called "The End of the World."

Quite unexpectedly, as Vasserot

The armless ambidextrian was lighting

A match between his great and second toe,

And Ralph the lion was engaged in biting

The neck of Madame Sossman while the drum

Pointed, and Teeny was about to cough

In waltz-time swinging Jocko by the thumb

Quite unexpectedly to top blew off:

And there, there overhead, there, there hung over

Those thousands of white faces, those dazed eyes,

There in the starless dark, the poise, the hover,

There with vast wings across the cancelled skies,

There in the sudden blackness the black pall

Of nothing, nothing, nothing -- nothing at all. 

Obviously, by "white faced, those dazed eyes" are looking up not into the "black pall" but into a dazzling fireworks show.

As I was mulling over how to respond to the challenge, I coincidentally heard  for the first time on the radio a lecture by e.e. cummings:

“Damn everything but the circus! ...damn everything that is grim, dull, motionless, unrisking, inward turning, damn everything that won't get into the circle, that won't enjoy. That won't throw it's heart into the tension, surprise, fear and delight of the circus, the round world, the full existence...”

I would like now to read his Non-Lectures (1953).  I also came across this:

"The Adult, the Artist and the Circus" (1925)

So, ungentle reader, (as you and I value what we should ashamed--after witnessing a few minor circus-marvels--to call our "lives,") let us never be fooled into taking seriously that perfectly superficial distinction which is vulgarly drawn between the circus-show and "art" or "the arts." Let us not forget that every authentic "work of art" is in and of itself alive and that, however "the arts" may differ among themselves, their common function is the expression of that supreme alive-ness which is known as "beauty." This being so, our three ring circus is art--for to contend that the spectacle in question is not an authentic manifestation of "beauty" is as childish, as to dismiss the circus on the ground that it is "childish," is idiotic.

from E. E. Cummings, "The Adult, the Artist and the Circus." Vanity Fair 25 (October 1925): 57 & 98.

In conclusion:  I explored two of my favorite poets using the Circus as a metaphor in very different ways.  So, the challenge led me on a rewarding excursus.

As for my own attempt:  I cannot say what the zentangle is a metaphor of.  It requires more analysis and meditation.  Certainly something about spectacle, something about art, something about risk and safety nets, and something about the mutability of all things--the circus finale.  And perhaps the geometry of form that informs all things, including the circus.

Weekly Challenge #226.  Guest Blogger Katie Crommett, CZT
http://iamthedivaczt.blogspot.com

The challenge for this week is "Simplicity."  The constraint was to use only two or three tangles.

As I thought about "simplicity," I was inspired by the pleasure of the wonderful sweet cherries which have arrived from Washington state.   I couldn't help noticing that it was raining here in upstate New York (again).  I represented the bounty of cherries spilling from a basket.  They seem to be floating in air because that is how they came to be at my table from far away.   The background is to suggest a bamboo fence to be in conversation with the Japanese-inspired pattern of the basket, and also to let me use the pattern for suggesting rain.   I found it restful and satisfying to work on this.  Thank you, Katie, for the challenge.

Challenge #225 Use Only Two or Three Colors

July 10, 2015

This blog is where I will post  my responses to the weekly Zentangle challenges posed by Laura Harms on her website I am the Diva at http://iamthedivaczt.blogspot.com/p/about-me.html.   I have been working on Zentangles for several years, but this is my first contribution to the weekly challenge.  I just became aware of the weekly challenge two days ago on Pinterest, where I collect examples of Zentangles I would like to try.

While Laura is away for the summer, Jen Crutchfield is posting the challenges.  Both Laura Harms and Jen Crutchfield are Certified Zentangle Teachers (CZT), so the challenges promise to be interesting and inspiring.

Weekly Challenge #225 was to create a zentangle using two or three colors, and no more.   I am posting two examples of my own efforts.  I have certainly enjoyed and learned from the contributions of other Zentanglers to this challenge.