Above the Sea

This illustration is inspired by the famous fairytale The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen, published in 1837.
I have always been fascinated by this story (as many other children). I have a very old Fairytale book that followed me around all of my childhood. This book has been particularly well loved in the Little Mermaid section... where some pages are starting to come off...haha

Fun fact: It is said, Andersen never specified the color of the little mermaid's hair (I do not speak Danish so I cannot verify that personally....). However, my (french) childhood version had illustrations of the mermaid with silver hair. It is also mentioned that the sisters trade their beautiful "silver" hair to the sea witch. Naturally, this stuck with me and this is why I illustrated my mermaid with this version in mind. 

This specific scene, represents the first encounter of the little mermaid with the human world and more specifically her prince, a little prior to the ship wreck. We see her here, as a curious soul and a dreamer.

🎨 Material Description & information:
- Printed in a French printing house on 250g mat coated paper.
- Available format: A5, A4 or 30x40cm
- Each print will be shipped in a cardboard sleeve (or a tube for 30x40cm format), carefully packaged by me with lots of love 💕.
- Colors may vary slightly from what you see on screen.

The true Little Mermaid storyline:

As all of her sisters before her, the little mermaid is curious to finally be able to swim to the surface to see the world above. She finds a ship that ends up sinking in the ocean and saves a Prince from drowning.
She soon learns that, the soul of humans are eternal and wishes to become one. She visits the sea witch to bargain a pair of legs in order to seduce the prince and become human.
Unfortunately, the prince falls in love with another woman et decides to marry her. The little mermaid, heartbroken, knows she is now to become seafoam.
Her sisters, in despair, visit the sea witch to find a way to save the little mermaid. In exchange for their beautiful (silver??) hair, the sea witch gives them a dagger to stab the prince with, for the little mermaid to change back into a sea folk.
However, she cannot stab her prince and throws herself into the ocean. To reward her for her decision she is turned into a "daughter of the air and light", immortal as she had so wished for.

I am going to translate the last sentence of my french childhood story book who has inspired me to draw this illustration:
"And, as the little mermaid was slowly flying away to a world of perfection, she heard a sweet voice calling her name and saying: It is your love who saved you".