Danielle Lee
Bodacious Baroque
Prompt: "Bipartite Art Project #2: Baroque Through My Eyes" The assignment requires students to create a work of art related to and inspired by the material on Baroque. This is an interpretation / re-interpretation of Baroque ("through your eyes") with visual (and textual) links to what we have learned about Baroque art from the module.
Inspired by the theatrical religious imagery of the Baroque artists, I decided to fabricate a cohesive B&W collage. The gold frame of the piece is highly ornamental because the Baroque style emits a grandeur aura with foliate corners and a convex front edge. Many statues in the architecture depicted angels to signify the omnipresence of God because Baroque brought religious representation back into the public eye. The Baroque churches also incorporated the symbolic feature of angels into their designs to encourage awe and intense emotions for the church place. Thus, I incorporated three angels in multiple perspectives to make it appear like one painting with the manipulation of Photoshop to increase the dramatic realism. Chiaroscuro is an extremely crucial characteristic of Baroque art which I highlighted through dramatic tension of black and white. Tenebrism was also widely used where artists heavily accentuated contrast within dark atmospheres. I intensified shadows with low opacity black with a soft brush around certain edges of the piece. On the edges, I added more ornamental designs for movement, richness, and drama. Withal, I wanted to incorporate all three elements of sculpture, architecture, and painting into one piece.