Before starting this week’s challenge post, I want to thank everyone for their outflowing of compassion, support, and advice after last week’s post. I am humbled by how many of you took the time to share your thoughtful advice and encouragement. I am truly blessed to be on the receiving end of so much love and good vibes. So, heartfelt thanks to everyone who read and commented.
I was delighted to find out that this week’s challenge is to do tangleations of bales. Bales is one of my favorite tangles because it is so easy to personalize. In fact, I had planned on giving this exact challenge to my Exploring Zentangle students for homework this week! I love serendipity.
Bales study 1. In this piece, I started by drawing an intentionally lopsided grid, then I changed things up with auras and shading. A few of them have parts missing, and some have diagonal lines added. After finishing this, I remembered that I had drawn a large grid because I had planned on doing bales within bales. Forgetting to do that led to Bales study 2:
In this tangle, I started with a large square, drew my rice shapes, then inscribed a square on the diagonal. I repeated this until it was too small to draw any more. Can you see all five bales shapes? The outermost bales had orbs filling the rice part and auras filling the open section a la crescent moon.
The next one is simply filled with orbs in a tessellation pattern. (By this I mean, draw the biggest orb possible to fill the space. Then draw the biggest orb possible in the remaining space. Continue until the space is filled with orbs.) I shaded the largest of these orbs to look like pearls.
The remaining bales have rice shapes both inside and outside of the square. The first is filled with stripes and the others are plain except for some black fill.
This is my favorite of the four and reminds me of the round-robin quilt squares I used to make, which then made me wonder what would it would look like if I tried to make a “paper quilt” using bales. The result is Bales study #3.
Still enjoying the challenge, I drew a curvy grid for Bales study 4.
Since this was getting so far away from the original bales, I thought it best to call it a night.
I hope you enjoyed this challenge as much as I did.
Tangled Up In Art 
I loved #2- bales within bales within bales!!!Barbara
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Awesome, especially the second one, so much depth.
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You've been busy!! I love the first one, it seems to be floating through space, light and airy. The shading in your second gives it so much depth. Very nice!
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They are all wonderful, Cris. But #2 is hands down my favorite, the bales within bales within bales. It's very special. I like the quilty one too, and the first one, and I think the fourth one is very whimsical.
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Lovely flowing lines have given bales a softness and graceful feeling!
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So many variations! Love the top two best – such great depth created with the shading 🙂
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Oh Cris that 1st one is sensationally creative.
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Wow, these are so graceful. I really love the simplicity of the third one.
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Yes indeed, I love this challenge too and had a lot of fun making mine. I love the way you did al the variations. The give bales a totaly different look. My favorite is the last one. It is so simple, so delicate and powerful. I love that.
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Think I like the flow of the first mostly because it is so different than what you first think with Bales. The others are great too. I like the depth created in the corners of the second one.
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Wow, I like your Bales and it's variations. The first one is my fav. because it's so lovely and delicate.
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They are all great but that first one I love! I am going to try and do something like that. Mine won't turn out as good as yours but it is always so much fun to try.
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