The Modest Mermaid

Honestly what "inspired" this was a drawing I hadn't finished in one of my sketchbooks and I wanted to try out a theoretical painting technique and colors for a mermaid's tale. So in reality, this was a practice piece turned finished work. Oops. It happens. I love the blues in this piece and I really have to start painting more mermaids with hair colors other than red (thanks Ariel, who doesn't love her though?!). I tried to find a contrasting color to the aqua that wasn't going to be too typical, although terracotta tones are complimentary colors, so there wasn't a whole lot of thinking going on there. Plus I need a color to go with the aforementioned hair. I think it worked.

I've called her The Modest Mermaid because she's covering herself up with an old sail (thanks again, Disney) and because she looks a bit taken aback as if she's thinking "what are you looking at?" We've obviously disturbed her peaceful afternoon sitting upon her coral flanked sandy seat.

Priestess of the Sidh

I wasn't entirely sure what to call this one. Is she human in service to the sidh? She stands before a wheel of time offering a cup to drink from, framed by a runic blessing.

Her look is simple, with reflections of Celtic style (braids, jewelry, tunic), as she has more important things to focus on.
The wheel behind her depicts two separate sets of zodiac. The outer wheel shows the animal prints of the Native American zodiac.* The inner ring shows the Celtic tree calendar.** The script written in the border I adapted from a longer Scottish blessing. It reads: