02 Saturday Mar 2024
Posted in 100 Day Project, Art
Tags
all the colors, block print, block printing, block prints, colorful, Colorful art, full spectrum, handcarved blocks, handcarved stamps, Mandala, mandalas, primary colors, rainbow colors, secondary colors, Torus Mandala, Zentangle Inspired Art
I am continuing my exploration of block printing for my 100 day project. I have been so excited about exploring torus mandalas and now I’m playing with the seed of life mandala.
06 Tuesday Feb 2024
Posted in Art
Tags
Art, block print, block prints, blue art, blue block prints, blue botanical prints, botanical prints, handcarved blocks, handcarved stamps, Mandala, meditation, tessellated block print, Torus Mandala, Versafine Clair Ink
I have continued my pattern play and have carved a variety of blocks to use in small and large torus mandalas. I have been having a lot of fun on Instagram following along with the Printer Solstice challenge hosted by Susana McDonnell. She provides a color combination prompt and I use various combinations of blocks and colors to create examples of the color scheme. Here I have posted some of my monochrome blue mandalas and some analogous yellow, green, blue mandalas. These are my favorite colors schemes if I have to pick, but I am enjoying all of the interesting combinations!
I am slowing uploading them to my Etsy shop as digital downloads for an extremely reasonable price. The larger mandalas are about 18 inches in diameter and the smaller ones are about 9 inches in diameter, but you can print them whatever size you want!
Yellow dahlia large torus mandala in analogous colors, yellow, green, blue. My followers on Instagram appreciated the photos with the blocks laid out to help see how these are constructed.
I have quite a few more printed but printing is a lot more fun that photographing and posting them. I hope you will check back in my Etsy shop to see if some new combinations of blocks and colors are available!
02 Tuesday Jan 2024
Posted in Art, Art on Exhibit, Zentangle Inspired Art
Tags
Art, botanical, botanical art, botanical collage, collage, floral mandala, flower, flower art, flower collage, Mandala, Zentangle, Zentangle Inspired Art, ZIA
This year has been a productive year for art, but not as many big pieces as I have made in the past. My most recent larger piece is Garden Party Mandala that is an experiment for a larger piece that is in the works. This one is going to be on exhibit at the University of Wisconsin Hospital in January of 2024. Keep reading for more information on this exciting opportunity.
It was a really great year for me on Instagram. I reached 1,000 followers and successfully participated in the 100 day project and Carve December. I just finished up Carve December and I’m really excited about it so I’m going to show pictures of it first.
Carve December is an Instagram challenge created by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer 11 years ago. I have participated for a few years but this year was something special for me. Julie provides a prompt for each day and this year I followed the prompts. I was exploring hexagons and ogees from a pattern design class I had just finished (description and photos below). I threw in some other shapes and also carved a few larger stamps that I have big plans for in 2024!
I took a deep dive into repeat pattern design with Ali at 3dottedpenguins. The class was so excellent. I have so many prints! There was a very inspiring and supportive community and the instruction was fantastic. I think the progress in my carving, printing and designs show the impact! It was also very helpful to have so much carving to do so no one block became too precious. That really allowed me to experiment with design and learn so much in the process. Playing with art supplies really is such a learning experience.
Ali challenged us to create a final project and I created 3! I was exploring integrating block printing into my mixed media art and also took one design bigger.
The 100 day project is another Instagram challenge that I participated in. The idea is to make art every day for 100 days. It can be whatever you want and I chose to create a small collage that included stamps, Zentange and collage papers and ephemera every day. It was an excellent exercise in creativity and I am happy with what I created. I have sent many out as cards and I’m not sure what I’m going to do with those that remain.
One of the reasons I got back into making art 10 years ago was that I hoped to see it in medical facilities when I went for appointments. This dream came true in 2023. I had 2 pieces exhibited at the University of Wisconsin Hospital last year and I’m scheduled to have 2 more in January. I joined the Wisconsin Visual Artist association and the Madison Art Guild and they each exhibit art in the hospital for one month every year. This piece, Abstract Waterlilies, was one of the first ones. The other was one of my flower mandalas from 2022.
I’m excited to see what 2024 holds.
Peace
12 Wednesday Jul 2023
Posted in Art on Exhibit
Tags
Art, collage, Colorful art, floral mandala, flower art, flower collage, Mandala, recycled art, Upcycled art, Zentangle, Zentangle Inspired Art, Zentangle Method, ZIA
Stop in at Hatch Art House at 1248 Williamson Street in Madison to see these and other small works of environmentally friendly art.
“Join Hatch Art House this July and August for the 2023 EcoSquared Art Show! Hatch showcases a curated selection of various artworks by over 75 Wisconsin artists most of the year, but opens the front two walls of the gallery to all Wisconsin based artists for the EcoSquared show nearly every year since 2012. EcoSquared (Eco for eco-friendly, Squared for square art) focuses entirely on square works of art made with upcycled materials by local artists. This year marks the biggest EcoSquared exhibition yet, with nearly 90 pieces of square upcycled art by over 25 Wisconsin based artists!”
07 Sunday Feb 2021
Posted in Art
Over the summer I created a series of small canvases as part of a fundraiser for our local art association.
I had so much fun with those that when I got my new stencils from Stencil Girl Products I made another 8×10 piece.
That started a series of 8×10 collages in September of 2020. My lofty goal was to create a collage a day. My realistic goal was to make art almost every day. And I did. Most of these have since been gifted, bartered or sold. Send me a message if you’re interested in one. The butterfly one is sold.
30 Saturday Jan 2021
Posted in Uncategorized
Hello again. Since I have started posting to Instagram (and it is so easy) I have neglected my blog. I want to do some catching up. When the pandemic started I bought a large sheet of hot press watercolor paper and started making a very large Zentangled mandala. I still have not finished shading it, but this year I want to finish things. I have developed a daily art practice over the last 10 months and would like to share what I have made with you.
The piece on the left is called Illuminated Journey and is a large (24×36 inches) mixed media collage that I made for a call for art. The call for art was a presentation to a hotel chain that was looking for art by local artists. Our art association didn’t have anything else going on, so we put up a show with a lot of different styles of art. It turned out that they were looking for landscapes and traditional representational art, but it inspired me to make this piece so I’m happy with the outcome. I put a lot of work into it and didn’t have an end in mind so it kept evolving. The inspiration for it is a book I got from the high school library purge that occurred while I was in my residency at North High School. The book is called Victorian Inventions by Leonard de Vries. If you look at the details in the close up pictures you can see a wide variety of transportation related inventions.
The backgrounds of the six small mandalas include vintage book pages that I wrote over with a blue pen. I saw an old journal with small blue writing in it that really looked interesting. I’m always on the lookout for interesting ways to write in my journals and art without it being legible and this is a new favorite. The mandalas that have black circles as a background include an unusual textural element, a circle of chipboard covered with black gesso and the netting that vegetables come in. It was kind of tricky to do, especially in a circle, but I love the effect and plan to play with it in the future.
I hope you have some beauty in your day.
18 Wednesday Jul 2018
Posted in Art on Exhibit, Zentangle Inspired Art
Tags
100 Mandalas, Art, Brookly Art Library, Mandala, mixed-media, Zentangle, Zentangle Inspired Art, Zentangle Method, ZIA
I created this mandala with the prompt “Homer” for the Canvas Project at the Brooklyn Art Library. This year I plan to participate in the Sketchbook Project as well.
I went with Homer Simpson, rather than the classical interpretation. The mandala is inspired by Homer’s yellow head with black curls of hair. This photo shows the collaged canvas and the tissue paper Zentangled mandala.
This is mandala 58 out of 100.
02 Friday Feb 2018
Posted in Gratitude Journal, Zentangle Inspired Art
Tags
100 Mandalas, Art, Art Journal, copada, Gratitude, Gratitude Journal, grid, grid art, Mandala, Mondrian, Tangle patterns, Tangles, Zentangle, Zentangle Inspired Art, Zentangle Method, ZIA
A few big ideas are included in this gratitude journal page spread. First, my husband picked up a 2018 calendar for our kitchen wall because our opportunities to get one at an art museum kept being thwarted. I had shopped on-line at the MoMA and Metropolitan Museum of Art’s shopping websites and the calendars were on sale, but the shipping seemed ridiculous. I had almost purchased a Mondrian calendar. When he called to say he was stopping at a store and asked if I wanted anything else, I told him a wall calendar. Guess what calendar he bought! If you have followed my blog for a while you may know that I am fascinated with grids and with Mondrian and he knows that, too. But isn’t it nice to feel known?
I have filled the grid with the ABCs of gratitude for beautiful places I have been. I may do one for places I still want to go. When I have insomnia I sometimes do an ABCs of gratitude in my mind. It can be for the day just past or anything I can come up with at 3 am. I know there are places I have left off of this grid, but I have really been to a lot of beautiful places! How blessed am I?
The right hand page is mandala 55 of 100. It is some variations on the Zentangle® pattern copada by Margaret Bremmer. She is such a talented artist and she has made some wonderful contributions to the world of Zentangle. I think I’m going to do some variations on this variation. I really enjoyed it. I’m so grateful for Zentangle® Inspired Art and all the good things that the world of Zentangle® has brought into my life.
I hope you have a beautiful day.
13 Wednesday Dec 2017
Posted in Zentangle Method Class
Tags
100 Mandalas, 100 Zendala Challenge, Art, DC345, Diva Challenge, holiday cards, holiday mandala, holiday Zendala, Mandala, Zendala, Zentangle
This is the Diva’s 7th anniversary of hosting the Zentangle challenge. Congratulations Laura! The Diva’s challenge was to create a holiday tile or Zendala. A Zendala is a Zentangled mandala. Join me this Saturday, December 16th from 2-5 to make your own holiday Zendala. Lets share a little holiday spirit while taking some time to meditate and create a small work of art. I will be at the Morris County Art Association Studio 10 Catherine Lane, Morristown, NJ 07960. There is a $5 materials fee that will include all that you need to create 5 works of Zentangled art. The class costs $40/$35 members per session. Please use the contact form on my website or call the Morristown Studio at 973-267-1722. I hope to see you there!
This is mandala 54 of 100 and Zendala 6 of 100.
Jeanette Clawson Art 