New Art: Orca Splash!

"Orca Splash" Watercolor by Amber Marine, © 2016, all rights reserved

Another mini splash painting in the series that sprouted from card-sized gift art, warm-up art, and spur-of-the-moment-inspired doodlings.

This was a warm up painting done before I painted The Matriarch, my watercolor of the famous wild orca J2 "Granny." It was painted and carefully detailed with teeny tiny nail art brushes.

As always, I've gotta talk about the animal subject! 🙂

Orcas (aka killer whales) are the undisputed apex predators of the sea. They are the largest member of the dolphin family. There are several sub-types of orca, most of which spend their entire lives in close-knit matrilineal family groups called pods. Pods pass their unique behaviors, communication dialects, and hunting techniques down the generations of their family – strong examples of culture. Orcas inhabit every ocean on Earth. I just did a long blog feature on this, but orcas are my favorite, so obligatory: One population of orcas is critically endangered. They are known as the Southern Resident Killer Whales. To learn about this amazing group of orcas that has persevered through so much chaos brought on by humans (and to find out how to help them) please visit WhaleResesearch.org