How to draw ZENWHEEL

Welcome to April 2020! What WILL this new month bring us?!

The “seasoned” tanglers among us will recognize that today’s Zenwheel tangle shares DNA with the Zentangle®-originals Huggins and Cadent, as do many fun and interesting tangles. (I’ve attempted to keep track of them on Cadent‘s page.)

Zenwheel is from tangler Melissa Bruce and it’s her first on the site.

Melissa introduces herself,

I’m from Albuquerque, NM. I got into Zentangle® when I saw pictures a friend was creating, and it reminded me so much of pictures my late brother would draw.

It got me excited to create and express myself so I jumped in and have been tangling ever since.

This is Melissa’s monotangle representation of Zenwheel.

Just for fun I smudged little graphite spots around the edges on my example to mimic the first step of Zenwheel. If you just take a quick glance at the remaining steps you might think all six of the strokes “take off and land” on the center dot. But look closer at Step 3 and you’ll see that the alternate strokes actually meet (or leave) the Step 2 strokes part the way up. This minor difference affects the end result! Take it from the voice of “took a quick glance” experience 😉

Melissa illustrates the step-by-step instructions for drawing Zenwheel below,

Image copyright the artist and used with permission, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. These images are for your personal offline reference only. Please feel free to refer to the images to recreate this tangle in your personal Zentangles and ZIAs. However the artist and TanglePatterns.com reserve all rights to the images and they must not be publicly pinned, altered, reproduced or republished. Thank you for respecting these rights. For more information, click on the image for the article “Copyrights and your blog.” “We must all face the choice between what is right and what is easy.” ~ Albus Dumbledore

As you enjoy any of the tangles on the site, please leave a comment of thanks and encouragement to show the artists you appreciate them for sharing their creativity to inspire yours. Your comment helps motivate them to continue to share!

Check out the tag melissab for more of Melissa’s tangles on TanglePatterns.com.

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Laughter is the Best Medicine

Today’s smile is courtesy of Marion “Martie” Kyde of Tinicum Township, Bucks County PA, who writes that her “very most favorite tangle is Cadent“, making this a perfect fit with today’s Zenwheel.

Martie writes, “I went out to gather ramps this morning, and these words just popped into my head. It is not great literary poetry, but maybe a little upbeat and appropriate for the times we’re in. Use it if you think it may make someone smile.”

Flowers in Spring, by Marion Kyde

I went to my window this morning –

The forest floor burgeoned with green.

I opened the frame to look into

The prettiest landscape I’ve seen

Daffodils here and hellebore there,

Bloodroot, anemones, squills –

It was almost enough to make me forget

The pandemic and all of its ills

The plague will still be here tomorrow.

How long after that we can’t know,

But depending on sunshine and weather

A succession of flowers will grow.

Life after Covid will surely be changed.

Who knows what the future will bring?

But one thing I’m fairly confident of —

There will always be flowers in spring!

So lovely, so heartwarming!

And if this wasn’t just perfect timing … my sweet sister Carol took this gorgeous photo a few days ago from one of her daily walks in Niagara-on-the-Lake (known as NOTL by locals). Carol’s photo goes so well with Martie’s poem and I have her permission to share this glorious still life with Ontario spring crocuses with you.

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Related Links

1. Looking for tangles by Artist or Type? For details visit the ABOUT > HOW TO FIND TANGLES BY ARTIST OR TYPE page on the top menu bar of any page on the site.
2. What is a Zentangle? — if you are new to the Zentangle Method, start here for the fundamentals.
3. Zentangle terminology — a glossary of terms used in this art form.
4. How to use the site — an excellent free video tutorial showing how to use the site as well as pointing out lots of useful features you might have missed.
5. Linda's List of Zentangle-Original Patterns — here is the complete list of original tangles (aka "official tangles") created and introduced by founders Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas, including those not published online. If you are new to the Zentangle Method I highly recommend learning a few of the published Zentangle classics first.
6. "A Zentangle has no up or down and is not a picture of something, so you have no worries about whether you can draw a hand, or a duck. You always succeed in creating a Zentangle." Thus patterns that are drawings of a recognizable naturalistic or actual object, figure, or scene, are not tangles. A pattern is not always a tangle — here's what makes a tangle. TIP: tangles never start with pencil planning.
   • Un motif n’est pas toujours un tangle — Qu’est-ce qu’un tangle ?
   • Un diseño no es siempre un tangle — ¿Qué es un tangle?
7. How to submit your pattern deconstruction to TanglePatterns
8. For lots of great FREE tutorials on TanglePatterns, click on the TUTORIALS link in the pink alphabetic menu bar below the tangle images at the top of any page.
9. Strings! Have we got STRINGS! Click on the STRINGS link in the pink alphabetic menu bar below the tangle images at the top of any page for 250 different (free) Zentangle-starters. More than enough for any lifetime!
10. Never miss a tangle! FREE eMAIL NEWSLETTER - visit the SUBSCRIBE page on the top menu bar of any page on the site and sign up to get notices delivered free to your inbox.
11. If you have questions about the TanglePatterns.com TANGLE GUIDE, visit the BOOK REVIEWS tab on the top menu bar of any page on the site for COMPLETE details!

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Share your tangle on TanglePatterns

Everyone is invited to share patterns on TanglePatterns.com, you do NOT need to be a CZT. In order for patterns to be considered for publication they must be submitted to me by email. In other words you have to let me know about them.

For a submission to qualify as a tangle it must be a genuine pattern (“a repeated decorative design”) and not “a thing to draw”.

From The Book of Zentangle:

“Keep it Non-representational. Zentangle artwork is intended to be non-representational. Zentangle’s elemental strokes are also non-representational.

We don’t teach complex elements such as hearts, stars or flowers. Tangles are also non-representational.”

Remember that tangles never start with pencil planning.

"A tangle has no pre-planning with pencil guidelines, grids or dots, no erased lines."

If you need a refresher on what makes a tangle, read the A PATTERN IS NOT ALWAYS A TANGLE page on the ZENTANGLES menu bar at the top of any page.

For details on how to submit your pattern for consideration visit the SUBMIT YOUR PATTERN page on the top menu bar of any page on the site. On that menu you will find these two pages:

1. 1. How to submit your pattern deconstruction to TanglePatterns, and
   2. Why hasn't my pattern been published?

The first page includes instructions on how to prepare and send your JPGs. (Please save me time and do not send PDFs). It also includes a link to this PDF submission form.

When your examples include additional tangles from the site, please list them in your email. (This saves me time and my memory some wear and tear.)

If your pattern is posted on your blog, attach your steps and tile JPGs to your email and be sure your email includes the direct URL so I can link to it.

And remember, to quote Zentangle's co-founders Rick and Maria: tangles should be "magical, simple and easy to create", non-objective patterns of repetitive strokes that are easy to teach and offer a high degree of success to tanglers of all ages.

"Keep the tangles as little like 'drawing something' as possible."

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