Mark Keathley Artist Signed Framed Open Edition Canvas Giclee:"Zita Alpaca"

Artist: Mark Keathley
Title: Smiley Jane Alpaca
Size: 12"w x 16"h
Edition: Artist Signed Open Edition | Framed
Release Date: 2020
From the Artist: As you may know if you follow us on instagram or Facebook, you will see us posting photos and occasionally paintings of our farm here in Ozark Mountains of North West Arkansas. Our journey into the animal world has been quite unexpected. Originally, we just wanted a few cows to mow the grass, but then I saw a gentleman on Youtube (Joel Salitin) who let a big home made portable chicken coop follow his cows to scratch and spread the manure and eat fly larvae. Well, heck, that seemed like a grand idea, so when the cows arrived, Colter and I set off to build a chicken tractor - a trailer with a coop on it, so you could pull it through the small grazing paddocks a week behind the cows. Well that first winter here, we heard coyotes every night, and saw foxes, eagles, hawks, etc, and knew that our chickens would not make it down in the pasture 1-2 hundred yards from our home, so we started checking on Live stock Guardian dogs. We settled on Maremma Dogs from Italy, but the lady who sold them said they didn’t “bond” with Chickens or cows, and would need something their size to bond with. So we bought 1/2 a doze St Croix sheep. When we went to pick them up, she had these huge heritage white turkeys that I fell in love with, so I ordered some hatching eggs. It worked, and 5 little baby turkeys were added to the farm. After we began eating a couple dozen chicken eggs a day, or feeding them to dogs, we learned that you could get allergic to eggs, if you didn’t have a different kind of egg to eat, so we bought 10 Khaki Campbell ducks. These cute little guys were so fun to watch as they waddled around the place looking for bugs and clover to snack on, and they blended right in with our Guinea Fowl (tick control squad) which we had 40 of. See how the dominos began to fall. Once they start to spill over, you just can’t seem to stop them, and it is going to be a mess, so you might as well enjoy it! That is when Landon said “I want to get some alpacas. We might as well, we have everything else. What is one more chore to do? We found a sweet couple that were having some health issues and needed to sell their farm, and they were looking for the right family to take their babies. She made gorgeous alpaca fur hats to sell at the farmers market (Green Ginger Alpaca farm) and was kind enough to let us pick up five of her favorite females to add to our farm. We got them in the late winter, when their coats were luxurious and full and I got some fun photos of them as they strutted around the place agains the gray backdrop of winter. As a thank you to this couple (Jane and Steve) I decided to paint them a picture of “Smiley Jane” - one of the most unique looking Alpacas I’d ever seen, as a keep sake. Then Bonnie said, “Paint Zita, too, she is the boss.” Well, two didn’t seem like a good number so I painted “Guinevere” as well. They just so happen to fit together as a nice triptych and we new at once people would love to share in the joy of these beautiful creatures as they add a smile to your face every time you look at them. ~ Mark Keathley