The bahlam is a big cat creature I designed for my senior exhibition. It is primarily based on a jaguar. I had always wanted to work with the jaguar as one of my subject matters, however, designing this particular creature was a long and difficult process, and I ended up with several different ideas. Eventually, I wanted to end up with a creature that had some sort of armor around its body, thus I finally found inspiration from an Indian Rhinoceros. The thick folds in the skin made for a believable armor, and helped decide my lavender-gray color scheme. I also referenced images of a hairless Sphynx cat and an Andean deer.

        The name for the creature comes from the Mayan word for jaguar, "balam."

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Image: Defensive Bahlam. Oil on Canvas. 2018.