Hey Friend! I'm Melanie

The artist behind The Swimming Owl.

I love ALL colors, reading fantasy, rewatching the same few shows repeatedly, cooking ethnic food, tinkering in my garden, traveling with my family, and just generally trying new things. You never know what I will be up to next because I tend to be a bit whimsical. Just ask my husband…. I’m sort of a creative whirlwind. I love to work with traditional paints when creating my fine art and then digitally on my iPad when illustrating books. I am what you might call a hybrid artist.

I am also a mom to my daughter, Arabella, and two dog babies named Quetzy and Kuku. We live in the cold (and usually snowy) Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Seriously, Summer lasts like 3 minutes here.

Email Me: melanieAbess@gmail.com

But really, you are wondering why The Swimming Owl... am I right?
Many many moons ago, while out on a walk with my husband in the woods (by his childhood home), we came across a very strange sight; an owl swimming in a pond. We could hardly believe our eyes as the great big bird swooshed (pretty sure that is a word) its wings through the water and moved from one end of the pond to the other. It seemed so darn happy to paddle around the pond… What was an owl doing swimming when we thought its life purpose was to fly? The sight of that owl swimming had me in awe for days. We still talk about "that owl we saw swimming that one time," and it inspired the name for my shop. If an owl can swim in a pond, I can open up an art shop and follow my creative dreams that once seemed too outlandish… and just see what could come of it!

If that made perfect sense to you, we might be long lost best friends. 😅

I’m glad you are here. 💜

My Art Process

My first love is mixed media oil painting! I went to college for art + photography, and my favorite classes were always my black and white photography courses and my acrylic and oil painting courses.

Now, I work both traditionally with mixed media and oil paints, as well as digitally in Procreate and Photoshop. I love mixing and matching the two and just working in the medium that is speaking to me at the moment.

But typically, I get my paints out for my fine art and originals, and then I switch to my iPad for illustrating coloring books and picture books.

I love getting super messy with my traditional materials and experimenting with color and texture. Then, when it’s time to work on a book, I love the flexibility of working on my iPad in forgiving layers.