Artistic Polar Bear Challenge: 100 Ways In 100 Days. #47 - Baroque

We're going to take a big leap forward in time, only because I'm too much of a chicken to try and apply the  Early Christian, Middle Ages and  Renaissance styles to a polar bear with only one day to try to study and create it.  But the Baroque period seemed a suitable place to stop the tour bus, so we've arrived in the time between 1600 and 1700.  Values were the focus of this period, with color taking a back seat, with many of the paintings appearing dark and gloomy, with strong contrasts between light and dark (chiaroscuro).  Artists first created their subjects with a grisaille (a black and white underpainting on a neutral canvas), then introduced color by glazing.  Notable artists of the period included Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Rubens and Vermeer.

Keeping with the theme of the day, the bear was first rendered in black and white, then glazed with earth colors to keep it subtle.

Baroque Bear

Acrylic on paper

I've worked with glazes before, but never in this context. It was rather freeing to have the values already mapped out and only have to apply the glazes.  Jeffrey Hayes is a favorite still life artist, and is one of few who start with a grisaille underpainting.  He details his painting method in his blog, and it's worth the read.   I'm looking forward to trying this method again, with more colorful glazes.