Family Divinity
Nate Mathews and Kim Ambriz are the faculty sponsors of this project.
Abstract
My presentation is about incorporating my daughter and wife into my paintings and expressing them as religious figures. My daughter is depicted as innocent as an angel and as divine as baby Jesus, while my wife is portrayed as the mother of Jesus, Mary. I focus on the theme of family, so I include myself as Saint Joseph to accompany the religious iconography of the other figures. When my daughter was born, I knew that I wanted to give her what I never had, a father. The fact that I grew up without a father and had an incomplete family played a significant role in painting this series. While thinking about my ideas and motivations, I researched themes and symbols that were used by the painters in the Renaissance and Baroque Eras, such as innocence and divinity. The reoccurring elements in these eras were the Madonna holding baby Jesus with angels surrounding them. My daughter and wife resemble these religious figures because I worship them just as the Catholics throughout history have worshipped biblical figures. Another component that emphasizes the elegance of such figures is a decoration of a painted frame for each of the portraits. The frame is meant to display them in a contained sophistication, but a hand of each figure is coming out and grasping the frame. The illusion is made to bring the portraits to life and come out of the containment of the frame, just as my wife brought our daughter and family to life. Strictly work with oil paints and large sized canvases allow me to capture fine details in the portrait paintings. I found that colors, gestures, poses, and attributes would enhance the meaning in a painting by giving it religious iconography. The angels at each side are at the base of the hierarchy and gesturing upwards, which is the way to salvation. The next sets of portraits are my wife and myself wearing the appropriate colored robes to match the Madonna and Saint Joseph. My daughter resembling baby Jesus on a small altar and also gesturing upwards is the high center point of the series. The number three is a strong symbol in Italian Renaissance and Baroque paintings to represent the Holy Trinity, which is why I chose to have the three portraits of my family in the center. “Family Divinity” is a series of five oil paintings depicting the beauty of having a family and the joys of being a father.
Family Divinity
My presentation is about incorporating my daughter and wife into my paintings and expressing them as religious figures. My daughter is depicted as innocent as an angel and as divine as baby Jesus, while my wife is portrayed as the mother of Jesus, Mary. I focus on the theme of family, so I include myself as Saint Joseph to accompany the religious iconography of the other figures. When my daughter was born, I knew that I wanted to give her what I never had, a father. The fact that I grew up without a father and had an incomplete family played a significant role in painting this series. While thinking about my ideas and motivations, I researched themes and symbols that were used by the painters in the Renaissance and Baroque Eras, such as innocence and divinity. The reoccurring elements in these eras were the Madonna holding baby Jesus with angels surrounding them. My daughter and wife resemble these religious figures because I worship them just as the Catholics throughout history have worshipped biblical figures. Another component that emphasizes the elegance of such figures is a decoration of a painted frame for each of the portraits. The frame is meant to display them in a contained sophistication, but a hand of each figure is coming out and grasping the frame. The illusion is made to bring the portraits to life and come out of the containment of the frame, just as my wife brought our daughter and family to life. Strictly work with oil paints and large sized canvases allow me to capture fine details in the portrait paintings. I found that colors, gestures, poses, and attributes would enhance the meaning in a painting by giving it religious iconography. The angels at each side are at the base of the hierarchy and gesturing upwards, which is the way to salvation. The next sets of portraits are my wife and myself wearing the appropriate colored robes to match the Madonna and Saint Joseph. My daughter resembling baby Jesus on a small altar and also gesturing upwards is the high center point of the series. The number three is a strong symbol in Italian Renaissance and Baroque paintings to represent the Holy Trinity, which is why I chose to have the three portraits of my family in the center. “Family Divinity” is a series of five oil paintings depicting the beauty of having a family and the joys of being a father.