Deep Reef Impression

10 x 8"

oil on stretched canvas

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I am trying to get away from my perfectionist leanings that prevent me from completing paintings. I'll occasionally do a painting like this one to help me loosen up on my 'normal' paintings.

There is a fish in this image, a Stoplight Parrotfish, right in the middle of the canvas. This coral formation is called Spur and Groove. Sand between long narrow coral heads, the sand eventually falling off into the deep sea.

Stoplight Parrot Fish

8 x 10"

oil on stretched canvas

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Such outrageous colors on a fish! The adult male of this type of fish is blue and green and other colors. They change from this color, somehow. This is an adult female Stoplight Parrotfish. I know I'm not making any sense, but there are strange things that happen on the coral reef. Like Parrotfish that all start life as females. Then, if there aren't enough males, one of the bigger female changes into a "Man Fish" as Islanders would say.