Napoleon Wrasse

SOLD - Commission (60cm x 50cm (24" x 20") Acrylic on canvas)
© Craig Bertram Smith
Please contact craig@wildlifeartist.co.za for enquiries or if you would like to get a commission painted.

Life around the reef is a fascinating mixture of colours, shapes and sizes! In the first few meters of water, the vibrant colours of the corals are very evident but as you go deeper reds and oranges of the colour spectrum start disappearing. This was one of my challenges in the painting. Whenever I can, I try keep things as natural as possible including colour and lighting, as you can see in the coral I have depicted. The corals have been muted through a filter of blue as the scene is depicted about 15 / 20 meters of depth.

Another one of my challenges was how I was going to showoff the napoleon wrasse, these fish are very beautiful and have quite intricate patterns, which is its camaflourge. So I had to separate the fish from the busy reef of similar colour. I decided to offset the fish against the plain deep blue and have it slightly silhouetted against the lighter areas showing the surface light.