Inside or outside the lines?

The classic way of tangling a tile is to proceed from one section to another, tangling a different pattern in each section. That's the way you're supposed to do it in a coloring book. I like keeping each tangle within its own section, but I realize that I'm in a rut about it.

My sister thinks of the sections as suggestions for where to put the tangles. She'll tangle something outside the lines into another section or out into the area beyond the border. She thinks that keeping the tangles within the sections is too restrictive.

The really great thing about Zentangle(R)--and what you will notice if you look at some of Rick Roberts' and Maria Thomas's tiles on their Zentangle website--is that they often go outside the lines. Just remember that they are the experts in this art and the tangles are in their muscle memory so it's very understandable. I saw them do this all the time at the Zentangle teacher training. (Many other very creative tanglers in the Zentangle world have a natural affinity for this as well.)

So I have free yourself from the lines on my own Zentangle development list.

April 26 Zentangle 1 class

A very enthusiastic group of Zentangle students and I had a wonderful class yesterday at the Urban Art Retreat and Studio in Asheville's Montford neighborhood. Here are the mini-masterpieces they created:

As I said to everyone when we looked at their mosiac together," I'm always amazed at how each person takes the same tangle and makes it their own". And that's the beauty of Zentangle, I think: to put your own spin on the group of lines that make up a tangle and express your innate creativity. Tangle on!

It's OK to recycle

Sometimes I start out on a tile and part of the way through my tangling I realize that I don't like it for some reason. Maybe my hands weren't warmed up enough and my circles look like ovals or my straight lines wiggle. Zentangle(R) isn't about perfection, it's about the experience, but like anything else--a main course for a dinner party--there is a degree of perfection that I want.

So what do I do with those tiles that I abandon? 

Sometimes I put them aside and pick them up later, tangling the empty sections or finishing the unfinished sections for the practice of tangling. Sometimes these tiles end up being to my liking.

Other times, I put them aside indefinitely. I might use them to test out my pens to determine if they're getting to the end of their life span (about 32 tiles according to Zentangle founders Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas).

One time I was working on a pre-strung Zendala tile. The inner sections looked good to me but the outer sections didn't. So I used an X-Acto(R) knife to cut out the inner portion, tacked it to a blank Zendala tile and tangled the now-empty sections. It was a not altogether successful experiment, but at least I did seek to make something else of it.

I often keep the black tiles to use in coaxing the ink out of a white Sakura Gelly Roll pen, or to wipe off any crusty leftover ink around the point.

And finally, some I just recycle.

Home hosted Zentangle 1 class in Alexander, NC

Yesterday, April 5, 2014, I had the fun and honor of teaching a Zentangle 1 class to a group of six women at a home in Alexander, NC. Here are the mini-masterpieces that they created:

Photo by Candace Hasty

I always find it a bit surprising and also wonderful how each woman, drawing the same tangles as everyone else, draws them in her own innate style. Wonderful, all of them, both the women and their creations!

Official Zentangle supplies

I've been asked, "Why use the official Zentangle tiles? Why not just any kind of paper?" and "Why the Sakura pen?" I think that there are two answers to these questions.

First, to get the best results from your work, use the best materials. Have you ever used something for an art project that was cheap but not up to standards? Let's say that you chose the cheapest watercolor paper and produced a beautiful watercolor but the paper buckled and wouldn't lay flat. There's all your hard work, almost for nothing.

Second, I have tried other pen and paper combinations--and I am sure that Rick and Maria tried many more than I can lay my hands on--and nothing else works as well. There's something, also, about the combination of the texture of the Fabriano Tiepolo paper and the patented fiber point of the Sakura pen that makes you slow down, that makes you concentrate on "One stroke at a time.(SM)" If you go too fast, the pen point can drag on the paper (the same thing happens when you press too hard on the pen) and your lines become jagged.

For the best results from your tangling time, stick with the official Zentangle supplies.