Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder they say, but my friend, honestly, This is beauty to anyone's eyes!

So this is how my mind processed this painting so i'll word it that way too. (well it exploded at first but i'll talk about what it processed after it got itself together in one piece )

The Concept: It's clear. As clear as water, that you wanted to paint a mermaid and that's what it looks like. Mermaids are beautiful subjects often drawn by every other artist. But, this is where you area n exception: Mermaids are usually drawn with their fish like tail, sea shell top etc. You didn't do that. Yet, you've achieved the mermaid effect. That's clarity in the concept right there.

Color Scheme : A painting is attractive and message giving if it's done with the right colors. I like dhow you used blue and red instead of the general color scheme a person thinks of for a mermaid-blue and green. what can i say? originality flows in you like a river (a li'l ironic ain't it?)

Originality : Everything you paint is immensely original. we have a pixie style and everyone knows it, admires it, and practice it. But this thing bagged teh price for most original work of yours. Right form teh character design, to the accessories to the color scheme, everything's is out of the box! so i'll go in detail on this. please bare with me as i do:

The hair: You bound teh hair (generally wavy), you painted it black (generally golden).

The accessories: it's the best part, you dressed with sea accessories. I loved who you used strings of small pearls and of course teh star fish! it's beautiful that you gave a ruby in teh heart of teh starfish. you embedded it with precious gems. such a beauty! Then there are teh sea shells and fins too.

The ear ring is like a friggin' fish rope with a bait! my god, how long did you spend in teh idea alone? or did they just flow? i personally dig teh blood on her neck. damn! fish are scaley and you often get cut, super concept! and also, teh amazing neck piece with teh shards. super awesome!

The Face Original pixie style face. awesome as ever. i liked how her lips are like fish lips (a li'l prettier than that of course!)

And teh finishing touch is the amazing gold fish and the beautiful over all shine. Wonderful job!

lastly, I think you had a lot of fun painting this and you i dont know how all your paintings are so neat despite the really precise technique. You are an amazingly original, one of a kind artist! You never fail to get my eyes popping out every time you paint something!

Your painting is quite beautiful and it is obvious that you put a great deal of work in it so I think it deserves a thorough viewing.

1. The colours are amazing. I can only congratulate you for the intensity and their well-defined contours both when there are actual contours (the headpiece) and when there are none (the blood from the gills or her lips). Having had quite desastrous experiences with water-colours myself I appreciate the excruciating care you must have taken here. I also like the nearly strict confinement to two colour-schemes: blue and red are a very interesting and striking choice and nicely balanced. They make the picture swing back and forth between cold and warm (maybe even life and death?) and add a great deal of movement to it. It's very interesting that you have taken the woman's and fish' usual characteristics and reversed them so that the woman is the cold part with her blue tones in lips, eyes, headpiece, skin (I refer to the greenish undertones of the neck) and clothing whereas the fish is full of life and warmth. The only flaw I can see in the colouring is the ear which is, in my opinion, a shade too much greenish-yellow. One doesn't see it on first sight but once noticed it's there. It breaks away from your well-definedness and the colour-scheme too much and makes it look like a foreign body. Maybe covering it up more with the fin next to it would have helped.

2. The amount of details in this work and their composition is awesome. I will restrain myself to those details I like most. The headpiece for one is beautiful but I especially like the shine you put on the pink and green gem. The same shine is on the bubbles and the blue pearls. To be honest, I was sure at first that this was alterated with CG. My favourite detail (if one can say it is) are the koi's fins and its scales. You did wonderfully there. I also like the patterns on her dress and in the general background.

3. As for the underlying story this pictures tells I like that she is no mermaid yet but aspires to be one. She still breathes air and the slashes at her neck aren't gills although they are in the right position. Her crossing over from human being to mermaid/fish is mainly carried by colour (especially the paint on her forehead reminds of some kind of Zebrafish) and symbolism. Apart from her face the only red part of her are her "gills" through which she is loosing blood. Therefor by loosing blood she becomes (in the logic of this picture) warmer and more fishlike a.k.a. her insinuated death as a human being causes her re-birth as a creature of the sea. I can't place the worm, since I am not sure if the koi is preparing to eat is but I like the subtlety of the whole composition.

4. As for visible flaws I have already mentioned the off-colouring of the ear. A logically mistake is the blood streaming from her wound - as she is underwater it should billow in a cloud, although that would have brought the wound right into the foreground of the picture. The koi's tail-fin is, in my opinion, unluckily placed. As I said above the picture is full of movement but with the tial-fin's flick to the right edge a lot of its dynamics is channeled right out of the picture whereas with a flick to the left it could have been used to lead the viewer's sight back to her and so creating a cycle of cold and warm, death and life.

5. About the rating: I am not sure what is meant with "Vision" and "Impact", so if possible, I will only rate "Originality" and "Technique" - both with 5 stars. I am very impressed with this whole work and appreciate the colours and the fact that it was made with traditional materials, which basically means a lot more care in painting since there are less possibilities to erase mistakes.

This is indeed a great piece of work and I thank you for sharing it.