Pink Flamingo in Stripey Boots

“We have to fight them daily, like fleas, those many small worries about the morrow, for they sap our energies.”
– Etty Hillesum

Copyright Beth Parker Art 2013

Stripey Boots on a Pink Flamingo

I sketched this little bird in an airport a couple years ago.  Goofy… maybe.  Bethville…  oh yeah!

I just finished putting graphics all over a box van for a construction company.  It feels so good to be inside where the air is cool. 

About Etty Hillesum

Etty Hillesum, less famous than her contemporary, Anne Frank, lived a short life of great courage. She was born in 1914 in the Netherlands to a Dutch father and a Russian mother. She studied law, Slavic languages, and psychology. Hungry for knowledge, she cut down on food in order to buy books. She went voluntarily to the Westerbork camp to help fellow Jews interned by the Nazis. Her letters detail her experiences; her more meditative diary focuses on issues of faith. She died at Auschwitz in 1943.

Fantasy Flamingo Boots – Watercolor and Ink

“Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.”
– Mark Twain

Copyright Beth Parker Art 2012

Fantasy Flamingo Boots – Watercolor and Ink

This is one I have not shown you before.  It’s really only a crop of a larger painting, since I’m doing the shoe thing this week.  That is actually a pink flamingo wearing these boots.   See the knobby knees?  I would wear these boots… okay, maybe not.  I am afraid of heights.   

Do you know someone who is wanting to start their own blog, but are afraid to try it?  Check out the new link in my blogroll.  How to create a WordPress blog – by Kana Tyler.  Kana is a great writer and she has posted a wonderful tutorial.

About Mark Twain

Samuel Clemens, the iconic American humorist and writer, is better known by his pen name Mark Twain. He was born in 1835 in Missouri. He worked at several jobs, including steamboat pilot and miner. He wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Prince and the Pauper, and other successful novels. His writing captured a very American vernacular and flavor, and helped create a distinctive American literature. He died in 1910.

These Boots are Made for Dancing!

"It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg."
– C. S. Lewis

 

These Boots are Made for Dancing!

5.5" x 7.5" Watercolor & Acrylic on Yes! Primed Linen

This painting was done from a reference by KreativeK at WetCanvas.  Thanks, Kay, for sharing this great photo.  Yes! is a really fun surface to paint on.  It's smooth and normally accepts watercolor beautifully.  I think this particular pad has been compromised by extreme temperatures in my sign shop, because the watercolor was wanting to bead up.

Here is a photo at 2 hours.  

I imagine I have over 4 hours in it.  First I drew the boots with a watercolor pencil.  I then outlined all of the lines with a Sharpie.  All of the colors, except the black and white, were painted in with watercolor.   The black is Golden Fluid Acrylic and the white is Winsor & Newton Iridescent White acrylic.  

For the background, I smeared some iridescent white on with a pallet knife and my fingers, then mixed some yellow and red watercolor into some of the white acrylic and smeared it on.  When the boots were completed, I filled in the white background with watercolor.  

Are you ready to go dancing?  he he he

About C. S. Lewis

Anglo-Irish author C. S. Lewis, called Jack by his friends, is best known for his children's fantasy series, The Chronicles of Narnia. He was born in 1898 in Belfast but settled in England after serving in World War I. He belonged to a writing group with J. R. R. Tolkien, whom he credited for his religious awakening. Lewis went on to write many Christian-themed books. His marriage to Joy Gresham, who died of bone cancer, was memorialized in the movie Shadowlands. He died in 1963.