u/pioalejos

I’m continuing my wildlife series with this portrait of a desert coyote titled "Spirit of the Mesa." Living in the Coachella Valley, I see these resilient animals constantly, and I wanted to capture that intense, amber-eyed gaze using traditional acrylic painting techniques on a 10"x8" canvas.

My goal with this series is to show that traditional wildlife art still holds a powerful place in our modern, digital world.

I am also currently competing in a global art competition (The People's Artist) and am sitting in the Top 20 in my category! If you enjoy this study of desert life, I would be honored if you took a moment to check out my main competition entry via the link in my profile bio.

This piece took me about 6 hours of work. I use a technique with layers of Bazzill paper to create physical depth before I ever touch a colored pencil.

This is a 7"x5" dimensional study of a bald eagle. To capture the power of the wings, I used 8 layers of hand-cut Bazzill paper to physically build the bird's anatomy before rendering the details with Prismacolor wax-based pencils. It’s part of my 2026 wildlife series.