The world of fairies is a special place that few people can channel. It takes someone with a visceral perception of this supernatural realm, which is inhabited by winged creatures, enchanted objects, frolicking elves, and a cast of merry pixies, statuesque sirens, ominous goddesses, ethereal nymphs, and spellbinding Queens. These woodland creatures have a special bond with Mother Nature and assist her in the maintenance of the forests posterity. Fairy artist Jacqueline Collen-Tarrolly captures this mysterious world of the fae folk in her paintings. Her collection is entitled Toadstool Farm Art, named after her home in San Fernando Valley, California called Toadstool Farm where she raises and breeds horses including Friesians, Gypsy Cobs, Fell Ponies, Percherons, and Arabians.

She holds to the belief that when the world of mortals and the world of fairies separated, horses were fairy creatures that chose to stay behind with the mortals. Her bond with her horses puts her in the role of their protector, and they as her kind friend. When she and her husband, actor Dean Tarrolly purchased their home, there was something about the place that resembled a fairy mound. It is widely known in Nordic and Celtic folklore that fairies live under toadstools, and for Jacqueline, her home Toadstool Farm is one big mound where fairies reside and act as her muse for her artwork. She has studied the work of such fantasy artists as James C. Christensen, Sir Lawrence Alta-Tadema, Amy Brown, Jessica Galbreth, and Selina Fenech who have shown her how to make the magical images that she sees in her mind become one dimensional figures on paper.

Her paintings are drawn on acid-free paper using a palate of acrylic paints. She described to Pagan Times that “I use the acrylic because it is what I am used to, I suppose. I like the vibrancy I can get with it that can so closely resemble oils, but without the wait time of oil. I have very little patience, there are too many ideas all fighting in my head and if a piece takes too long I burn out on it. I also like that acrylic can be diluted with water to achieve a watercolor-y like effect. It’s kind of the jack-of-all-trades in terms of paint to me, and I love to layer paints and stuff like that. You can’t really do that too much with watercolor, but there are certain effects one can get with watercolor that you can't with acrylic, and with other mediums that you can't with paint etc...So I use what strikes me as the most appropriate for the effect I'm after. How does a piece get created? I dunno...It hits me like a ton of bricks, won’t let me sleep ‘till I get it at least sketched out.”

The ideas for her paintings are quite elemental to her nature as she reveals to Pagan Times, “I guess I'm an Elf myself and it's a way of relating to that realm. I see other worlds and other life around us that is not on the main radar of most people, I suppose. I sense life all about me, in the shifting of dry leaves on a street, in the budding flowers on my rose bushes, in the mistletoe that grows profusely in my Sycamore tree.”

Jacqueline can imagine ethereal figures pushing the leaves across a street or sitting on flower petals putting the different dents that you find on them. Her series of Tea-Stained Fairies allow her to use her imagination and see images that most mortals never thought existed in chaotic specks. She begins the process by brewing some strong tea or coffee and then places her sketching paper in the hot liquid, allowing the paper to soak in for about an hour. What comes out are stains with varying textures and coloring on the paper forming what Jacqueline calls “bits,” which inspire her to see the fairy that peeks up at her on the paper. It takes an artist with psychical abilities to know what to do with paper that has been tea stained to make it into an image of beauty.

Other series in the Toadstool Farm Art collection include The Romantics which show lovers in a gentle embrace, the Pastime Fairies which show fairies performing human activities like The Fairy Of Obsessively Picking Weeds From Your Garden scene and The Fairy Of Shopping Till Your Cards Are All Maxxed Out print, and then there are the Fantasy Fairies which show these nymphs more seductive side. Some of Jacqueline Collen-Tarrolly’s artwork has been published in books like “500 Fairy Motifs,” “The Art of Fairy,” “Watercolor Fairies Book,” and “The World of Faery.”

Her artwork is not only sold as original paintings and mass produced prints but they are also put on note cards, bookmarks, mousepads, key chains, patches, stickers, coffee mugs, figurines, ceramic tiles, magnets, journals, photo albums, invitations for baby showers and weddings, and thank you cards. She also makes artwork for other fairy art sites such as myfairybaby.com, thefairycourt.com, and threefairybabies.com.

Each year Toadstool Farm Art sets up a booth at several Renaissance Festivals where items such as the aforementioned objects as well as oracle decks and fairy jewelry are sold. In the past, Toadstool Farm Art booths have been stationed at FaerieCon Festival in Philadelphia, the Southern California Renaissance Pleasure Faire, and the Northern California Renaissance Faire.

Fairy Art lets us believe that woodland creatures are magical beings that need humans to respect their forests, especially their toadstools, so everyone can benefit from its beauty. Fairy Art was particularly popular during the Victorian Age (1837-1901) with such burgeoning painters as John Atkinson Grimshaw, Joseph Noel Paton, John Anster Fitzgerald, and Daniel Maclise establishing a modicum of popularity for the genre. The art form continues to thrive today in pop culture with such mythological-based films as Pan’s Labyrinth, Lord Of The Rings series, and the Narnia series. Artists like Jacqueline Collen-Tarrolly in addition to the numerous Renaissance Festivals that are staged across the globe remind humans that the world of fairies and the world of mortals are dependent on the natural resources of nature, and destroying nature inevitably destroys humans and the world of enchanted beings.