Hey everyone, welcome back! Today we're continuing with my Classical Art Reinterpretation series with the painting Saint Serapion, by Francisco de Zurbarán.
On a side note, sorry for posting this so late. I spent the first half of the day in a sick haze. For some reason I have really bad allergies right now... even though it's the middle of winter... and even though I NEVER get allergies. So weird. So I spent the morning watching The Mindy Project, haha.
But moving on to Zurbarán. He was a Spanish painter during the Baroque period, who lived from 1598 to 1664. He is known as a Caravaggisti, which is the term of painters who were influenced and mimicked the mannerisms common in Caravaggio's body of work. In particular, Zurbarán displayed a heavy use of chiaroscuro. If you remember back to my post about Caravaggio's The Birth of Venus, chiaroscuro is the use of strong contrasting values. Zurbarán's became so masterful at chiaroscuro, that he became known as the Spanish Caravaggio.
Serapion, just like Sebastian, was a real, flesh-and-blood human. He's known as Saint Serapion of Algiers and was venerated as a martyr by the Catholic Church after he offered himself as a hostage at Algiers in exhcange for a number of Christians who were held hostage by the Muslim leadership of the city. He died in 1240 after being nailed on an x-shaped cross and dismembered.
The painting of Saint Serapion was commissioned in 1628 by The Mercedarian Order, a Spanish order of monks and nuns. It was painted with oil on canvas, and makes strong use of chiaroscuro. The painting isn't one of Zurbarán's more famous works. He's more known for his still life, Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and a Rose. But I've always loved this painting because of the drapery and the folds, which Zurbarán managed to paint with such incredible detail and realism.
Today, the painting is on display at Wadsworth Atheneum, in Hartford, Connecticut, in the United States.
And here is my interpretation of the painting:
I REALLY loved how this one turned out. There's something really simple about the image that just strikes me. This one isn't a composite, like many of the others, and it was all shot in the studio. My model for this one was a friend and classmate, Nick Caballero, who also posed for a couple more recreations that I have yet to finish... (procrastination is a killer).
Nick did such a good job on this shot, and he plays a monk pretty well, haha. I made the costume out of bedsheets that I cut and folded to mimic the look of the painting as best as I could. I decided to take out the sepia tones from the original to give my reinterpretation a strong sense of monochromaitc chiaroscuro, and I think it turned out pretty striking.
Overall, it's a simple image compared to some of the other recreations I did, but I think I managed to pull off the chiaroscuro feel of the original pretty well.
Next, I'll be talking about Self-Portrait with Thorns and Hummingbird, a Frida Kahlo self-portrait reinterpretation of mine that won a lucrative spot in Applied Arts Magazine last year.
And of course, if you're interested in seeing other images from this series, you can check them out here.
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And you can check out my debut fantasy novel, The Children of Gods and Monsters, on the Amazon store, here.
Also check out the prelude to The Children of Gods and Monsters, also on the Amazon store, here.
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