Paintings as reference

I continued using water colours and created these tiny ‘fish girl’ paintings, I had a lot of fun making them as I was not thinking about a final outcome. At this point I had started using paintings as reference material instead of photos. I found that this is a great idea if you want to loosen up your style, as a painting has more levels of seperation from reality than a photograph. I referenced artist with loose styles, that also create work centred around story telling and folklore, as I felt these types of artists would be more compatible with the Asafo flag art style.

I really liked their blue hair as well as the way the colours bled into one an other, and I could see myself using these little fish girls as part of a larger painting in the future. That said, I feel that I could have painted some of them a little more loosely.

Comparing the one on the left to the one on the right: I like how the paint loosey blends and flows on the one on the right, whereas the one on the left is a lot more stiff.

This is the painting that I used as a reference image- Fish With Human Face from the “Book of Marvels” by Zakarīyā ibn Muḥammad al-Qazwīnī