Diva Challenge #311, Made by Joey #160, Travelling Tangles and The Bare Bones

Diva Challenge #311

String Theory: Circles and Squares

Many thanks to The Diva, Laura Harms for this fun challenge and her  new streaming venture. I managed to catch a couple of the streams over the weekend...sort of. My internet is veerrrrryyyy slooooowwww, so the videos spent more time buffering than playing. In spite of that, watching and listening to her even in broken up bits and pieces was an inspiration. Another upside was that I spent more time drawing than watching.

This is what I worked on while watching the stream

It's so enlightening to see how others work through a tile. It's also comforting to know that others go through the same struggles figuring out what to do next. It was a great coincidence that I managed to catch a stream she did Saturday night as she completed a couple of her Travelling Tangles at the same time I was working on one of mine.
I love this weeks String Theory challenge. Strings are the best. As much as I love venturing out into the world of free form organic creations, strings are mac 'n cheese to me and are the foundation of a dynamic composition. My string guru is Margaret Bremner. enuf said.

Last weeks "Frunky" challenge post included a batch of Travelling Tangle tiles I was getting ready to send out. I briefly touched on my process while using one of my TT starters to complete the Diva  tile. I mentioned how could understand the difficulties my swap partners may have finishing one of my tiles and one of the comments prompted me to do a Bare Bones post of my next Travelling Tangles piece.
But first, heeeere's Joey...

Made by Joey #160

Finish My Tile Alphabet Series: "O"

featuring; "O2"

additionally: Opus and Oskie

This is a Bijou series I'm working on as headers for my pattern library binder. I tweaked Joey's original start by changing the font style of the O and incorporating O2 into the letter rather than the background. I really like the pattern O2 but I was confused by the step-out that Joey links to.

A Travelling Tile Bare Bones:

Raye Burnett sent me this lovely ATC. She uses the same tissue paper coloring technique that I do so I thought this would be a comfort zone piece to start with.
Step 1: Stare down and study. Determine what tools you're going to use. What did she start with? Do I have them? Do I want to keep going with it or start something new?
My arsenal of colored fine liners is pretty sparse. My favorite liner is a black Rapidograph refillable pen, so I generally decide where to introduce black if it's not already there. Raye's line looks like dark blue.

Step 2: String or no string? On a tile like this I keep rotating it and study the shapes emerging from the colors. I saw another band shape emerging and drew in a light string line.
Raye's graphic beginning and the break up of color at the top had me thinking to go graphic below and organic in the V shape.
I have a mantra "Contrast equals interest" a quote from one of my art teachers in grad school, so I chose to go bold in the blue.

 Step 3: I need reference to decide what patterns to use. Sometimes I can just wing it if the tile awakens something instinctual. I try to avoid going online to search for patterns because it's such a huge time waster, but I do it. I find Eni Oken's Shading Zentangle Facebook group my go to stop. Mostly I have my sketchbook. I chose "Rockpool" to contrast the bold lines of Raye's start.

Step 4: I use Margaret Bremner's Prestwood a lot. I wanted something wavy and dimensional to compliment Raye's start.
I was about here when I got the twing that the Diva was going live...

...so I missed photographing some steps.
Diva Dance came next. I filled in the rest of the blue areas with a Prismacolor pencil.
I was actually planning to do something organic and freeform in the V section like Fescu, Pokeleaf and Zinger, suddenly Frunky just came out of nowhere.
I shaded with warm grey Tombow brush pens and added highlight with a white Prismacolor pencil and a Signo Uniball white gel pen.



I'm calling this "Hey You're Just Too Frunky For Me" (Thank you George Michael)

So that's it for now!

Thank you so much for stopping by! I'd love to hear from you. Any questions or comments are welcome, encouraged and much appreciated.