When I was still an active classroom teacher, our art program had a very intense grade 9 course. All the students worked in an 8" x 11" hard covered sketch book through the full semester. Since I only taught the nines occasionally (this class was about 12 years ago) I found it helpful to follow along in my own book - working with them when I had the time. Design was a major component of this course and we always chose to start with line. They would develop a cover design in coloured line, an inside cover design in black pen and at least 2 other exercises later on.
My local art enthusiasts meet on Wednesdays in the winter to do a variety of interesting activities and I decided to check out their meeting this up coming week. They are going to create "Zentangles": structured, contained doodles. I was curious so I Googled the name and discovered the following information:
"The term 'Zentangle' was coined by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas when, one day, Maria described her experience, as she created her art, as "feeling timeless, free and engendering a sense of deep well-being". Rick recognised that she was in a meditative state and so Zentangles were born."
It's interesting how creative minds seem to stumble upon similar ideology all over the world at similar times.
The following designs are mine and were created in the late 1990's.
Book Cover
Inside cover design
Split Person line work
and Doodlebug
I kept my book and I think most of the students still have theirs - many years later.
