El Naddaha

El Naddaha, "the caller," is a siren that haunts the Nile in Egypt. She is described as a tall, slender, beautiful woman with white—some say transparent—skin and long flowing hair. She calls to a man by his name in her soft, sweet, hypnotic voice, and lures him to his doom in the river. No man called by her can resist, and none survive their encounter.

I found a reference photo I loved for both its color and ambiance and also its interesting angle/perspective, and have been wanting to paint this for awhile, as a sort of companion piece to my "Nereid" portrait. Both the mood and the story are a bit darker than that one; I used similar colors for the background, but layered them more richly and did a finishing glaze of thin lime green to unite the entire picture—background, hair, and skin—to maximize the impression that she is submerged in water except for her face. This was one of those backgrounds that I was initially loathe to paint over, because I really liked how it turned out; but you have to sacrifice one thing sometimes to achieve another.

I'm not entirely satisfied with the white parts around her neck and chest that are supposed to signify a slight disturbance in the light on the water, but after reworking them several times, I decided to let them be. Perhaps I will revisit in a few days, when I can look at it more objectively.

When I initially saw the photo I thought of Ophelia of Shakespeare fame, but didn't like the passive nature of her story, so I looked for another with which to identify my portrait and found the ominous Egyptian legend recounted above.

The "Caller" is acrylic, with layered stencils for the background, on thin birch board, and is 16x12 inches.