A Wiz of a Manicurist Nails the Competition With Her Finger Painting
Lorrie Fisher was talking about the Wizard of Oz as if he was at her fingertip.
In fact, he was.
“Some of this is really outrageous and crazy,” said Fisher, 28, a manicurist and fingernail artist who painted the entire story of the Wizard of Oz on real three-inch-long fingernails and won first place in the recent Goddess Finger Nail and Toe Art Show in Las Vegas.
Fisher, a Buena Park mother of two, next plans to paint Prince Charles and Princess Diana’s wedding on those same fingernails for the June International Nail and Beauty Show in Anaheim.
As a matter of fact, she said, the wedding scenes might be more difficult than the Wizard of Oz, which took her 36 hours to complete and consisted of such characters as the Tin Man, Cowardly Lion, Scarecrow, Wicked Witch of the West, the Wizard, Toto the dog, Dorothy and scenes of the destructive tornado. All were done with acrylic-based paint.
At the Las Vegas show, Fisher was dressed as Dorothy and her model, Suzanne Deinstadt, a manicurist from Cerritos, was outfitted as the Wicked Witch. Contest rules required contestants to resemble the theme of their art.
“Nail art has been growing more wild every year,” said Fisher, who won the top cash prize of $50, not much considering it cost $30 to enter. “It was winning that was important,” she said, noting that reputation means money. She charges $20 an hour to put art on fingernails.
“Flat” nail art requests for the holiday season at Angie’s Nail Shop in Buena Park, where she works, includes Christmas bells, trees and decorations, but Fisher, who draws and oil-paints in her leisure time, said she also is busy painting brides’ nails with such scenes as a bride and groom on top of a wedding cake, wedding bells and the date of the wedding.
“Flat nail painting is really tame compared with three-dimensional fantasy art that might have dragons glued on,” she said. “That wouldn’t be used except at a show because you wouldn’t be able to use your hands.”
While there’s a growing clientele for fingernail art, “we get some calls for toenail art, too,” said Fisher, a self-taught artist who believes “it’s fun and people can admire art no matter where it is presented.”
On men?
“We haven’t had any calls from men, although we have done some nail artwork for female impersonators,” she said.
“Choose Booze . . . You Lose” and “Hugs, Not Drugs.”
Those messages will get wide notoriety thanks to the thinking and artistic skill of eighth-grader Nessa Ursua, 14, of Anaheim, who won a poster contest sponsored by Anaheim’s Sycamore Junior High School anti-drug club.
A billboard firm donated advertising space for 30 days at State College Boulevard and La Palma Avenue beginning Jan. 26. Nessa said she knows students who use drugs and feels that if they would read her messages, they would stop and think about what they are doing.
Naida A. Osline thought it would be nice to have a little family portrait taken, say of 10,000 people. “We’ve already received 500 pictures,” she said.
The plan is to have anyone who lives, works or goes to school in Fullerton send photos of themselves that will later be put on a permanent 25x48-foot mural, sort of a community self-portrait. It will be unveiled in April to celebrate city’s 100th anniversary.
Osline said many of the pictures sent were taken years ago and reflect the history of the city. “We have some shots taken in backyards, in homes and at places in downtown Fullerton,” she said, noting that she hopes to get pictures “that say something about the quality of life in Fullerton in the 1980s.”
And to open it to everyone, said Osline, a community services center administrator, “even ID pictures you take at a photo booth will be acceptable.”
Acknowledgments--Community activist Ruth Kahn, 81, of Newport Beach was named winner of the first “Wonderful Older Woman” award from the Older Women’s League of South Orange County “as the one who has made the greatest contribution to middle-life and older women in Orange County.” Eight women were nominated.
