Swan Love

For this design, I took a photograph of a swan in the moat outside of the Imperial palace in Tokyo, Japan, and used it to create this beautiful fantasy Valentine's Day design! In Japan, swans are often associated with beauty, elegance, and purity. The also can symbolize fidelity in relationships. I also chose to use swans for this Valentine's Day project because they have long slender necks which curve conveniently enough to form a heart when you mirror two of them face to face! The kanji symbol against the heart-sun backdrop is the character for "Love" which is pronounced "ai" in Japanese. The swans and a little bit of the water were the only aspects not hand drawn in this image because they were part of the photograph I used. I added the heart-sun, colors and reflective lighting, clouds, and kanji symbol myself. The kanji character was hand painted using traditional Japanese Sumi ink and calligraphy paper and transferred to digital format and overlaid on the background. Thank you for taking a look! I hope you enjoy my work! Please consider purchasing a print and/or as a gift for someone!