Zentangle Value Strip

Artist Statement

The subject of my creation is a grey scale value strip made up of "zentangle - like" drawings, fading from darker, higher concentrated, to lighter and more sparse. It was made with a pencil sketch first, then inked with pen. Within the assigned boundaries, I chose to make my value strip one smooth, cohesive design, rather than choppy boxes of different designs. I took some inspiration form classic henna and mehndi designs, and I do tend to doodle a lot of similar designs in my own time as well, so the process was nothing new to me.

In this piece, I used a lot of line and value. The whole project was called a "value strip", therefore it was kind of a given that value would be used. Also, the whole thing is composed of line and shape, with all the intricate designs I used to depict my value strip. My project didn't evolve too much, actually. I sort of had an idea of how it would look the whole time. It did change a little bit when I inked it all in, though. I added lines I hadn't had in my sketch and redesigned the whole light and of the scale on the fly, because I decided I didn't like the way my sketch had it.

I'm not entirely sure what kind of an answer you are looking for here, but this piece doesn't have a story. I did the assigned work, even though I found rather creatively limiting. I drew the value strip. What kind of story does a value strip tell? And I know I could have made up some intricate story of all the "internal meaning" the piece holds, and pretended I had this story in mind the whole time and didn't make it up just to answer this question, but I figured it would be better to tell the truth. So I am. This project relates to my life in that I was able to draw all of the same kinds of doodles I draw on my hands and on my school papers. If I could go back in and fix some things about the piece, I would change how I did the lighter end. I don't like how I just repeated the same pattern for so many boxes, not changing anything with it as it goes on. Other than that, I like the piece fine.