Happy Friday the 13th folks! National Geographic observes, Friday the 13th is back. Here’s why it scares us.
I’m not at all superstitious although I will admit that on occasion I do knock on wood as a preventive measure, just in case 😉
Male tanglers abound in the the Zentangle® universe and many are subscribed to TanglePatterns however they don’t generally seem to speak up much. Considering that half of the two-person team who founded Zentangle is male and also how many CZTs are men, this is indeed a curious phenomenon. Just saying it’s curious, that’s all.
However today we have a tangle from Spanish tangler Tomàs Padrós who joins several other male tangle contributors on the site.
Tomàs hopes to become a CZT in the future and writes,
I am from Barcelona. I discovered Zentangle in the spring of 2016 and I was immediately fascinated.
I am a high school and college teacher. I studied Fine Arts and teach artistic drawing, technical drawing and history of art.
There’s no anecdote in the creation of this tangle. It emerged while drawing, simply.
Tangles often emerge intuitively, much to our surprise and general delight.
Membranart actually requires more concentration than I thought when I first looked at it. Using Tomàs’s first example as my guide, once I had the top “layer” done I found it an interesting challenge to visualize where and how the underlying layers fit the overall puzzle.
When you view the examples Tomàs has provided you’ll see that unlike my flattish example above, Membranart is very dimensional. So here’s what happened: I was unsuccessful with the shading in the small spaces I made and I didn’t feel like starting over. So out came my trusty Tombow Mono eraser (gasp) to remove the smudges and then I simply added graphite to the middle “layer” to push it back from the top layer.
Membranart is like Hallowe’en + Swiss cheese + Hollibaugh all in one …
Tomàs illustrates the step-by-step instructions for drawing Membranart below and he features it in a cool monotangle with shading emphasizing the layering and giving it a pillow-y look. As he points out, Membranart can be developed in two different ways. The first as shown below and the second by starting at Step 3 with a cluster of “holes” of random size and placement then adding the outer stretches of the “membranes”.
Image copyright the artist and used with permission, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please feel free to refer to the steps images to recreate this tangle in your personal Zentangles and ZIAs, or to link back to this page. However the artist and TanglePatterns.com reserve all rights to these images and they must not be publicly pinned, reproduced or republished. Thank you for respecting these rights. For more information, click on the image for the article “Copyrights and your blog.”
Here are two more examples of Membranart in Zentangle monotangle tiles with Tomàs’s fine shading adding dimension and that puffy look.
A Hollibaugh and Membranart combination.
As you enjoy any of the tangles on the site, please do leave a comment of thanks and encouragement to show the artists you appreciate them for sharing their creativity to inspire yours.
Check out the tag tomasp for more of Tomàs’s tangles on TanglePatterns.com.
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Like some help with shading your Zentangles?
It's fun and easy — forget about traditional "art rules" for shading, this is Zentangle and those rules do not apply!
As we are coached in the chapter on Shading in the Zentangle PRIMER Vol 1, "Ignore the light source ... in Zentangle shading we do not consider the type or direction of the light source. ... More often, shading is a component of the tangle itself that we use to play with dimension, emphasis, and contrast."
Everything you need to know is here in two free tutorials on TanglePatterns.
- TanglePatterns Shading Mini Clinic, Part 1 by CZT Marizaan van Beek, and
- TanglePatterns Shading Mini Clinic, Part 2 by CZT Sandy Bartholomew
You can always locate these and many other helpful tutorials by visiting the TUTORIALS tab on the pink alphabetic tangle menu bar as shown here:
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October 13, 2017 | 
More like this: 
I’ve recently begun to follow Tomas on Instagram. He’s created some beautiful tangles, and his work is fabulously creative. I’m glad to see him represented here.
I always scan the new CZT group photos to see how many men are represented. There usually are fewer than half a dozen. Perhaps many of them are camera shy.
Thank you for your support, Miriam. I don’t know why there are so few men in the world of the Zentangle. Few but significant (ha ha ha). Perhaps some men associate the Zentangle with other crafts traditionally associated with women (sigh). In many photos, only women are shown and many men foolishly ignore these “feminine” environments. Stereotypes are like that. Both the Zen component and the design component should be able to attract men equally. Getting it and undoing stereotypes would be a great achievement for equality and for the Zentangle
I truly like the look of this new Tangle Pattern, and I cannot wait to try it! I am drawn to the dimensional factors of it. Thank you,Tomas,for submitting this for all of us to enjoy.
Thank you for your very nice comment. I hope you enjoy this tangle.
Great tangle! I am looking forward to try it! Thanks for sharing!
Enjoy drawing it. Thank you very much.
Thank you Tomas for sharing……this one looks like a keeper for sure and I look forward to playing and being challenged by it!
Thank you very much for your comment. Nothing better than a Zentangle challenge to develop creativity. I’m sure you’ll do something great.
I LOVE this tangle and can’t wait to try it! Thank you Tomás for sharing and Linda for continuing this site and all the work you do!
I am delighted with the kindness and receptivity of all who are in the world of zentangle. It has been a great discovery. And of course, thanks to Linda.
Hey Thomas! That’s great! Love your various samples. I can see how this can truly help for awkwardly shaped spaces in a String. Thank You
Great. You convince me. I think this tangle can be a good resource for filling unclear spaces. I’m glad you’re going to try it.
Welcome to tanglepatterns.com Tomas! I’m glad you have joined because I know you have a lot to contribute from our communications on instagram.com. Have a look through the site because there is so much to find that is great value as a Tangler! It is like the Wikipedia of Zentangle since the beginning! Linda does a great job of maintaining this site which we are all grateful for. Most of all have fun learning and tangling! Look forward to more tangles. This is a great tangle that I’ve used lots of times and find it very versatile! Thank you
I feel very welcomed! I knew this website since I discovered the world of Zentangle a year and a half ago through a book by Bette Winkler (blessed be). I visit this site to know new tangles and practice them. I never thought that one day I would find a design of mine in it. Your advice has been essential. Thank you.
This is a fabulous tangle Tomàs! I haven’t tried it yet, but I will today. I didn’t get to this yesterday as my whole focus was on the fires here in Sonoma County in California. Today it is much better where I am and I realized I hadn’t checked this yesterday. I’m glad I got to it today. I love all your examples and the 3D effect. But Linda, I also like yours very much too. It is almost spookier and more Halloweeny (is that a word? LOL). Thank you for sharing this with us Tomàs!
Thank you very much Melena. I hope the fires are soon controlled and I pray for it. Enjoy with Membranat.
I’m a huge fan of organic tangles, and this one is fantastic! Thanks for the contribution, Tomas. My only complaint is that the urge to explore this tangle is sure to distract me from tackling some chores today. Lol
Blessed distraction. I hope your work does not distract you from making a great drawing with Membranart (Hahaha). Thank you very much.
Lovely and fun! Thanks Tomas for the share.
Thank you for your words and support.
This my new favorite tangle. It’s magic how it becomes 3D. Thanks for sharing it with us
Very pleasant comment. I’m delighted
I absolutely love this tangle, it’s so much fun to draw! I can’t wait to see what delightful places it going to take me to. Thank you, Tomàs and Linda.
I’m glad it’s fun. Great! Enjoy it!
Tomás, This was love at first sight; such a simple tangle to draw but, when shaded, creates quite an impact! Endless possibilities with this one. Looking forward to exploring them. Thank you!
Thanks to you. I hope you enjoy it and you find new possibilities.
This is so fun! I can’t wait to use it in my more masculine tangles!
Thank you but…masculine tangles? What’s that.
CZT Lynn Mead has posted a tutorial for her new technique called TransluZENce using Membranart to demonstrate it. I’ve added Lynn’s TransluZENce to our ZENTANGLES > TERMINOLOGY page with a link to her tutorial.
Very innovative technique Tomas! Will share it with my students here in California. Nancy CZT18
I’m very grateful. Enjoy it!
Amazing work! I enjoy looking at your work!
The #5 and #6 boxes are blank so its hard to follow, any reason that the boxes are empty?
They’re blank because there are no more steps, at that point you’re done except to add shading.
I love this tangle! I’m OK with the two layers, but have been struggling with the third (and more) layers, and was hoping that the empty boxes in the step out above might help! I’ve tried pencilling in numbers for each layer as I draw them, but still seem to get lost! I’m determined to figure it out, but any help would be wonderful!
To: gailmcarthur
May I suggest drawing the closest layer first completely. Then the next closest layer second completely. and so forth. I also had a go at it using this technique but different layers of ink. The first layer was black ink over white including large areas in black ink. The second layer was white ink over the black space of the previous layer. Only managed two layers. Hope that helps. Linda D
Thanks for your response, Linda! I think I might doing some holibough in one of the inner “circles” today, and see how that goes!
Great choice.
wow very good tangle!!!! thank you tomas!!!!