Kinnaree - Work in Progress

A kinnari/kinnaree/kinnara is mythical creature with the top half of a human, usually a woman, and lower half of a bird (often cited as "swan" in English-translated literature but pictorial evidence suggests otherwise) They describe themselves as thus:

We are everlasting lover and beloved. We never separate. We are eternally husband and wife; never do we become mother and father. No offspring is seen in our lap. We are lover and beloved ever-embracing. In between us we do not permit any third creature demanding affection. Our life is a life of perpetual pleasure.

In Thai mythology, they are akin to angels or muses, flying between the human and mystical world and being the very ideal of song and beauty.

Traditionally, they look like this:



Just getting to the base idea and pose here was more exhausting than I'd like to admit. I wanted to definitely keep the kinnaree's lower half as a bird even though contemporary trend has her sporting human legs more and more often. I could go on and on about the anatomy problems that comes with a woman with wings on her hips and bird legs, but let's just say there's a reason you don't see ostriches sit in chairs...