Tag Archives: mandala

A Simple Geometry

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Diamonds, triangles, and squares

Triangles and diamonds

Once I read a Navajo fairy tale in a picture book about a weaver who became some obsessed with perfection in her work that she became trapped in her own art, as if she sewed her soul into the design. Navajo weavers always leave a “way out,” some imperfection in their pattern, to prevent this spiritual entanglement, a fact of which I was reminded when we visited Tuba City in the Navajo Nation last week.

This mandala also reminds me of that legend. The turquoise color and the shapes reflect some of the art we saw on our journey. Of course, I never have to worry about leaving myself a way out of my mandalas, since it’s been many years since I even imagined that perfection was possible in drawings. This one is pretty tight though, even if it skews a bit.

 

 

Mandalas Make Your Mind Go Round

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There’s plenty of room for this colorful rainbow mandala in your happy Tuesday, is there not?

I am a little ray of sunshine.

I am a little ray of sunshine.

Love the colors in this one, and the rosace quality of the mandala itself. Without making an effort to wear my crayons down equally, I would most likely compose all drawings as rainbows, or in shades of blue. I do try to explore the full chromatic spectrum, but it takes work, especially when exploring oranges and yellows and neutrals, to which I am not at all drawn.

This is one of the mandalas that might get turned into a T-shirt in the future. And speaking of T-shirts, if you would like to purchase a fine one, RedBubble is still offering a site-wide sale on shirts until midnight tonight. Just visit the QWERTYvsDvorak RedBubble shop, select any of our exquisite merchandise, and use coupon code RBTEES15.

Thursday, Take Me Away!

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For your consideration, a brief gallery of potentially enlightening or confusing images.

Hissteria, a confounding dragon. I suspect that Hissteria mesmerizes you, and then eats you.

Hissteria, a confounding dragon. I suspect that Hissteria mesmerizes you, and then eats you.

There is something very pleasing to me about this dragon’s dimensionality and weirdness. I can see her twisting in the wind, like those flying snakes that turn their bodies into sails, except Hissteria is more of a corkscrew. As you squint at her spiraling form, asking your spouse, “What is that thing? Do you see it? What is it?” Hissteria strikes, devouring you headfirst. Or maybe she’s just misunderstood.

A well-formed mandala

A well-formed mandala

Here’s your weekly mandala; this is a fairly regular one, with hints of traditional quilt design along with some of the crystal theme that I examine more later.

A small percentage of the mandalas in this collection were pieces I worked on a bit but never felt satisfied with. I never threw any out, but there are some that certainly feel unfinished, and also at a dead end. This is one of them:

Actually, something about it feels kind of subatomic to me. This mandala is not as disappointing as it originally seemed.

Actually, something about it feels kind of subatomic to me. This mandala is not as disappointing as it originally seemed.

Substance is what you make of it

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Before the Wacom tablet, when I was just writing novels, an extra four hours a day working on the computer didn’t really affect my brain, because I touch type, fairly accurately, at around 70 words per minute, and didn’t have to actually look at the screen. When I first started learning digital painting, staring at the monitor for hours on end gave me constant headaches. Eventually, my eyes seemed to adjust to the strain (plus, as I improved my control over the stylus, I didn’t have to work on the pixel level with the screen 8 inches from my eyes.

I’m starting to wonder, though, if staying up all night on Photoshop is contributing to my insomnia. It’s been pretty bad for the last couple months.

That is my excuse for not having anything really pithy to say about art, beauty, creativity, or writing at this time.

I do however, have your weekly dose of mandala and fanciful dragon, all rolled into one!

This dragon looks like she would make a good friend.

Wyndolyn, a cheerful, airy dragon, looks like she would make a good friend. She would totally take you on magical rides to fantastic lands, or, if you were just looking for a sympathetic ear, would be willing to listen to all your problems. She would never even complain about the fact that she was born without arms or legs.

That is a good-looking dragon.

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This mandala was drawn for Rabbit, who, in addition to kale and organic carrots, is also fond of textiles and cottage industries associated with women. For example: quilt making. This design is based on common quilting designs. I have tried my hand at quilt making in the past, which resulted in 5 broken sewing needles and very lopsided, unsymmetrical blanket, which fell apart in a couple years. Rabbit made me a quilt once as a graduation present and the angles are brain-breakingly perfect. Some people just have talents and skills.

And that is a pretty mandala.

Honestly, I did have some pseudo-pithy words about art, but I put them all into next Monday’s comic, so no need for redundancy. All I need is regular sleep. Which I can’t have.

3-Dimensional Dragons

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If Cox took all the energy they direct into trying to sell me cable and long distance for 2 devices I don’t even own and devoted it to maintaining the network that renders the device I do own fully functional, this post would not be so late.

For your Friday pleasure, please browse an assortment of 3D dragons, I models with my own little hands.

Dragon number 1 sprung forth into existence some 2 or 3 years ago when a game-maker friend mentioned that 4 little lumps of clay were reserved for the construction of a dragon figurine to be used in a game she had created. I took control of the project and came up with this handsome fellow, Perhaps his details are a little rough, but he’s only 1 inch high, and my hands aren’t that small.

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It took 4 shots to encompass all his adorable qualities.

It took 4 shots to encompass all his adorable qualities.

Next on our list we have a rather old dragon. In 1993, student teaching at a private elementary school for hippie children with rich grandparents, I came across a lump of dried clay, in which I couldn’t help but see the whorls and angles of a dragon’s face. The principal told me that I was wasting my time, that the lump would crumble, that it was too thick to ever be fired. I ignored him and coaxed this friendly face into the world.

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A rather serene dragon, with only a little chip missing from his horn.

Finally, completing our triumvirate of dragons, a dragon pendant I made in 2006 while playing with my ex-boyfriend’s daughter.

Of course, the fuchsia fellow on the right is actually a cat, not a dragon, but he came into existence at the same time as the dragon, and they are the best of friends and go everywhere together.

Of course, the fuchsia fellow on the right is actually a cat, not a dragon, but he came into existence at the same time as the dragon, and they are the best of friends and go everywhere together.

Wait, what’s that you say? You want a hardworking bubblegum punk mandala before you go. BAM. Enjoy.

Pentagram mandala is in the house!

Pentagram mandala is in the house!

In case you wondered what Dragon is up to, Dragon is doing well, thanks! I already have one comic for next week, and if I finish a second one this weekend, maybe I’ll try to create them on a M-W-F schedule.

Trifecta!

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It’s Friday. I have inadvertently snapped my cherished prescription sunglasses in two. There’s a large blister on my left ankle. The universe continues to aggressively overlook my sublime genius. My husband is blasting pop hits from the ’70s through his speakers. So it’s looking like a 3-mandala kind of day.

Sometimes, things get very crazy internally.

Sometimes, things get very crazy internally.

These are old mandalas, and I don’t remember drawing then, or what was going through my head when I did, but they’re all pretty exuberant and cheerful. Sort of expansive, as if they wanted to encompass all the generative power of the universe.

Sometimes a single piece of paper cannot contain the intricacies of the mind.

Sometimes a single piece of paper cannot contain the intricacies of the mind.

They’re also all very free and unrestrained, drawn without the squawking voice of the inner critic complaining about an inherent lack of perfection. If these mandalas were people, they’d be participating in the Body Love Conference.

This one is pretty pleasing and pleasant.

This one is pretty pleasing and pleasant.

Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling much more centered now.

Here’s a Spectacular Hodgepodge of I Don’t Know What

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Finding myself without any pithy observations regarding art, writing, or the intersection between the two, allow me instead to offer a completely random assortment of recent-ish images.

Let's call it a snake in the grass

Let’s call it a snake in the grass: torn paper mosaic from 2013

I’m pleased that today was a good day, writing-wise. Got about 3500 words out on this graphic novel script, which is nothing to sneeze at, although I could have done a few thousand more words if I’d been stern with myself.

Have a pointy mandala why not?

Have a pointy mandala why not? This one puts me in mind of a compass rose. It’s quite skewed.

I also read and critiqued a friend’s essay and discussed it in what was essentially a one-woman workshop. As an old veteran of Iowa-style workshop (I’ve taken 10 of those suckers, 6 at the graduate level) I can offer pretty good feedback. Would that I could read my own writing the way I read others’.

October 2013

October 2013 I apparently cut out some weird looking pumpkins. The one in the center is by far the saddest jack-o-lantern I have ever created.

This bulletin board is one I didn’t like well enough to put in my original gallery of bulletin boards, but it’s OK. Eventually, I’ll get them all up. The quote, if you can’t read it, is from Percy Bysshe Shelly: “There is a harmony in autumn, and a luster in its sky.” Since I have space considerations, and my target audience is on average, 8 years old, I often use small segments of quotes. This one continues,  “which through the summer is not heard or seen, as if it could not be, as if it had not been!”

Sort of a Sad Story

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It’s been a couple years, but this still gets me.

Everything is complicated.

The Dissertation Mandala: everything is complicated.

Just deleted an 800 word post, because it didn’t say what I meant it to say.

The story of this mandala, in short, is that I had a friend for 17 years, a close friend, a woman I considered one of my best friends. Although there was a parabolic pattern to her love for me, I always loved her. However, we fought with increasing tendency, until she eventually told me, in no uncertain terms, never to contact her again.

Of course, there’s more to the story than that, but the story of this mandala is that, maybe six months or a year after she broke my heart, she emailed to say that she still never wanted to talk to me again, but she did want to hire me to edit her Ph.d. thesis, and for various reasons, only one of which was money, I accepted.

It was a hard edit. The dissertation was hundreds of pages long, and its quality didn’t come close to her previous work that I had read throughout our friendship. It took a couple weeks to make a single pass on the manuscript. She seemed satisfied with what I’d done and paid me; I haven’t heard from her since, although I miss her often.

This mandala depicts the layers of emotion and complexity I felt while reading her work.

Getting Centered

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This is a case where drawing a mandala really did serve primarily as a centering exercise.

It’s not easy to get me angry, but when there’s something to get really angry about, my brain gets obsessive. My husband and I received some upsetting news the day before we were scheduled to go down to Florida to visit my grandparents, and we agreed that we wouldn’t talk about it until we got back. Of course, we were both thinking about it the entire time. When we returned, we both had to deal with the situation, which I did by writing a 2000 word email. It took about 2 hours. The words had been brewing and stewing in my brain all week, and by the time I finished, I was in a massive state of agitation. Drawing this mandala helped me regain my composure. I deliberately used rainbow colors to lift my mood, although the skewing of the pattern shows to me how off-kilter I was at the time.

Mandalas Are Magic Part 3

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This whimsical punk mandala was inspired by a visit to the Hot Topic store at the mall

This whimsical punk mandala was inspired by a visit to the Hot Topic store at the mall

One thing I don’t worry about when I draw mandalas is perfection. Another think I don’t worry too much about is symmetry. My soul is clearly not perfect. And it is clearly not symmetrical, so why would my mandalas conform to that pattern?

A mandala inspired by satellites

A mandala inspired by satellites

Most of the mandalas in the collection are abstract, but some of my favorite ones are representative. Often, the silly and imperfect ones are the most-eye catching.

Inspired by a burlesque show

Inspired by a burlesque show

I can be serious too. One of the more complicated mandalas represents the emotions I experienced while editing the doctoral thesis of a former friend who refused to talk to me but still seemed to think I was the best copyeditor she knew. She paid me a good rate to work on her long and involved dissertation, but refused to renew our friendship. Another mandala was drawn as my mother-in-law began treatment for breast cancer.

Sometimes, it’s good to be playful about serious things, too.

Most women can probably figure out what serious monthly life event I have amusingly commemorated here.

Most women can probably figure out what serious monthly life event I have amusingly commemorated here.