~Cicely Mary Barker~

 
Cicely Mary Barker was born in West Croydon, Surrey
on June 28, 1895 
She died on February 16 in 1973
She was the illustrator who created the famous
Flower Fairies, in the shape of ethereal smiling
children with butterfly wings.
As a child she was greatly influenced by the
works of the illustrator Kate Greenaway, whom
she assiduously copied in her formative years.
Her principal influence, however, which she duly credited,
was the artwork of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.

She was only sixteen when she had her first work
accepted for publication as a set of postcards,
and from that time she devoted her career to painting.

Ze was pas 16jaar oud toen voor het eerst een set
met ansichtkaarten gepubliceerd werden,
en vanaf die tijd heeft ze zich helemaal ingezet
voor haar carrière.

Cicely Mary Barker always used real-life models
for her paintings. Most of the models came from
the kindergarten her sister Dorothy ran in the back
room of the house in which they lived. She also
painted the children and relatives. One of her models
was Gladys Tidy, the young girl who came to the
house every Saturday to do the household work.
Cicely Mary always asked the child model to hold
the flower, twig or blossom of a particular fairy,
for she wanted to be sure of the accuracy of her
depiction of the shape, texture and form of the plant.
Her only alteration was to the size, she enlarged the
flower to make it the same size as the child.
Cicely Mary's flowers are always botanically accurate.
If she could not find a flower close at hand,
she enlisted the help of staff at Kew Gardens,
who would often visit with specimens for her to paint.
Cicely Mary's Fairies are not ethereal fairies of the
supernatural, but portraits of real children, whose
characters match the characters of the flowers. 

Ze tekende altijd echte kinderen en
echte planten en bloemen.
Haar modellen kwamen vanuit de kinderopvang
die haar zuster leidde, achterin het huis waar ze woonden!
Een van haar modellen was Gladys Tidy,
Het jonge meisje kwam elke zaterdag 
het huishoudelijk werk doen. 
Cicely Mary's bloemen zijn altijd botanisch nauwkeurig,
als ze een bepaalde bloem niet kon vinden
riep ze de hulp in van het personeel in Kew Gardens
(soort tuincentrum)
Ze wilde zeker zijn van de juistheid van haar
afbeelding van de vorm, de textuur en vorm van de plant.

If you would like to know more about Cicely Mary Barker
Click here!

 Old Rhymes for All Times. 1928.

Cicely Mary Barker was geboren in Croydon op 28 juni 1895,
en is overleden in Worthing op 16 februari 1973
Ze was de illustratrice van de zeer bekende "Flower Fairies".
Van kindsaf was ze zeer geïnspireerd door Kate Greenaway.
Haar werkelijke inspiratie echter verkreeg ze
van de Prerafaëlieten.

Ze studeerde aan de Croydon School of Art en
ze is lid geweest van de Croydon Art Society.

Devoted to her mother, Cicely presented her with a first edition
of Flower Fairies of the Spring, with this respectfully loving poem:

To mother,
This tiny cup of
first fruit wine, 
I call it mine,
But it is yours.
And why - because
You are the vine,
And I am yours,
And this is mine.
Thus, tendril-like,
the words entwine,
The vine, the wine,
The 'mine', the 'yours',
Yet in one world they do combine,
- I and my vintage,
All are THINE.
With love from Cis, 1923