Try Zentangle Patterns in Animals

My Zentangle Monster

Good morning everyone. I hope you like my monster filled with Zentangle patterns. Incidentally, have you heard of Zentangle drawing? Actually, it’s been very popular for a few years now. Of course, my drawing is only inspired by this style. Because I haven’t got the hand control or the patience to do the beautiful, intricate patterns that people do. Although I do admire them very much. In fact, I heard about this style of drawing a couple of years ago at my drawing group. And we decided to use animal outlines as a template. Have a look at what I did then.

The Ink Fish ( !)
A Decorated Penguin

Anyway, the main point of these exercises is to enjoy yourself and to create a feeling of calm as you draw. And, it really does work – I feel it myself and I have seen the soothing effect on my art buddies. In fact, it doesn’t seem to matter whether you are creating something original or following along someone else’s design. Because, the result is the same – a calm, quiet room full of contented people! I drew my zentangle patterns at our art society meeting recently and I sketched a made up monster outline. Then, I amused myself drawing the lines of pattern design so that they followed the contours of the body. When I was looking through my picture gallery I found another recent attempt at the style. And, this time it was for one of last year’s Inktober prompts – tick.

Zentangle Patterns for Inktober

Tick

To be honest, I think it’s a good idea to try something completely different from your usual art practice. Certainly it refreshes your ideas, and that’s always a good thing. For myself, these new ideas seem to find their way into my quick abstracts like the fruit one in this post here. And I do believe that they can take your art into new directions that might even surprise you! But, also, it’s fun to do work that’s a bit less serious from time to time.