grizzly | Artist Commentary

Painting in progress by Amy Guidry; Acrylic on canvas; 12″ x 12″; (c) Amy Guidry 2017

After working on a few other projects for upcoming shows, I finally have a chance to get back to my grizzly bear painting. And I’m at the point where I can work on the face, which is when it really comes to life. The subject becomes more real to me once I paint the eyes. Even if I don’t know the subject, it’s when I paint the eyes that they come to life. They take on a personality. It’s exciting for me as an artist to witness that transformation.

This painting is an acrylic on canvas, 12″ by 12.” I’ll be posting the finished piece soon. In the meantime, you can check out the rest of the In Our Veins series here: https://amyguidry.com/gallery.html.

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A few photos of my current painting in progress. I had started this painting just a few days before Grizzly bears were removed from Endangered Species status. Sad, but fitting. 700 bears in the wild is not a high number, especially if there is a major disaster, and to ensure no genetic mutations occur due to inbreeding. Our priorities need to change. So it’s fitting that I happened to choose a Grizzly as my subject for this piece. We are steadily creating desert landscapes full of our garbage- in this case, a junkyard of cars- as we clear out the natural habitat of so many species, many endangered. I used flowers growing out of the bear’s back as a reference to our connection to nature; this lone patch of flowers mirroring the small, shrinking natural landscape.