Work of local artist featured in 2023 Art is Ageless® calendar

Vi Elliott Beyer, a former Arkansas City Presbyterian Manor resident and the sister of current resident Elsie Tipton, is one of several artists whose work is featured in PMMA’s 2023 Art is Ageless® calendar.

Vi’s mixed media piece, “Ribbon of Peace,” was started during a nine-week period when the artist was battling COVID and looking for ways to keep herself entertained.

“I was so sick and so bored and trapped in the house. I was sitting there one day and pulled out art supplies and I just took a pencil and etched a background and started filling in,” said Vi.

While the circumstances surrounding the creation of “Ribbon of Peace” were unique, Vi’s process was spontaneous. That’s the way she generally prefers to work.

“I just sit down and start. Then I add a little of this and a little of that. Finally, I just tell myself to quit. Enough is enough,” said Vi. “A lot of my paintings are just joyful accidents.”

Maybe it was partially due to the somewhat relaxed manner in which Vi approached the piece, but she says that she was beyond surprised to learn that she had won.

“I was shocked when I won a blue ribbon on it and was dumbfounded. Then my son moved in and claimed that it’s his and I can’t sell it. I gave it to him for Christmas and it’s the first one I ever signed,” said Vi.

Although she has been painting ever since she took a watercolor class in the 1970s, this was the first year Vi had entered one of her pieces into the Art is Ageless competition.

“I had never entered my stuff because to me it looks amateurish and I just do it for my own entertainment,” said Vi.

But now that she’s gotten that first taste of success, Vi says she will most likely continue to enter in the future.

To see more work like Vi’s, or to get a calendar of your own, visit artisageless.org.

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