After quite a bit of a tussle with the internet not seeming to work correctly for me (apparently I had something set wrong as it is fine now), and then taking a “break” so to speak to celebrate my younger daughter’s 14th birthday, I am finally off and running again, so to speak.

Today’s Digital Freebie is another illustration from L. Frank Baum’s The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900), whose original drawings were done by William Wallace Denslow. This is not one of the main characters, but actually a rather minor one. As Dorothy and her companions are making their way south to see Glinda the Good Witch of the South after the mishap wherein the wizard’s balloon leaves without Dorothy, they cross a land where everything and everyone is made of porcelain.

 ”Now there is Mr. Joker, one of our clowns,” continued the china lady, “who is always trying to stand upon his head. He has broken himself so often that he is mended in a hundred places, and doesn’t look at all pretty. Here he comes now, so you can see for yourself.”

Indeed, a jolly little Clown now came walking toward them, and Dorothy could see that in spite of his pretty clothes of red and yellow and green he was completely covered with cracks, running every which way and showing plainly that he had been mended in many places.

The clown put his hands in his pockets, and after puffing out his cheeks and nodding his head at them saucily he said,

“My lady fair,
Why do you stare
At poor old Mr. Joker?
You’re quite as stiff
And prim as if
You’d eaten up a poker!”

“Be quiet, sir!” said the princess; “can’t you see these are strangers, and should be treated with respect?”

“Well, that’s respect, I expect,” declared the Clown, and immediately stood upon his head.

“Don’t mind Mr. Joker,” said the princess to Dorothy; “he is considerably cracked in his head, and that makes him foolish.”

This, of course, had a lovely illustration of Mr. Joker standing on his head, which I edited a bit and cleaned up, and now gift to you!

Mr. Joker, the clown made of china, from L. Frank Baum's _The Wonderful Wizard of Oz_, 1900, illustrated by W. W. Denslow. Public domain due to age. From Google books.

I chose him this week because I have finally finished the first set of Oz digis for my Artfire shop:

Oz Set #1: Thirteen digital stamps based on William Wallace Denslow's illustrations for the original 1900 publication of the L. Frank Baum's _The Wonderful Wizard of Oz_. $18 for all 13 in my Artfire store.

For US $18 you get 13 stamps in Oz Set #1:

1. Dorothy holding the Silver Shoes
2. Toto
3. Toto sitting up and wearing the Emerald City goggles
4. The Scarecrow (whom you may have gotten while he was a freebie, which is no longer)
5. The Tin Woodman (also once a freebie but no longer)
6. The Cowardly Lion
7. Oz himself, sitting on a stool
8. The Scarecrow and Tin Woodman carrying Dorothy and Toto out of the field of poppies
9. A small group of Munchkins
10. The Good Witch of the North
11. Glinda, the Good Witch of the South
12. The Wicked Witch of the West, sitting on a chair
13. “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” in an Art Nouveau font – this stamp is not available individually, but only comes with the set

From this... (this is PD image btw, feel free to save it!)

..to this (sans watermark, etc.)

Or even more daunting:

From this... (again, PD image, help yourself)

..to this. And this one, because it is so small and will not enlarge well, is only US $1.25. But it was the only illustration of Glinda I could find by Denslow rather than John R. Neill or other artists.

Don’t get me wrong! I like what I do – and do not begrudge the work I put into freebies, but… this is why not all of my stamps, even if made from PD images, can be freebies, and why some of my freebies will (after at least 2 weeks as a freebie) convert to non-free stamps. I simply cannot put in the amount of time I do (even if I enjoy it) without asking for compensation sometimes. And I don’t even have to spend the time to draw my digi-stamps (because I use old graphics as the basis instead) like most other digital stamp creators do – before they even get to the “cleaning up and converting” part.

But now, at least, I hope you understand why freebies don’t always stay freebies (not just here but by other artists as well) and why Alison on the Free Digital Stamps blog always says to leave the digital artists “some love” when you take a freebie. So they know their work is appreciated.

Sorry, getting off my soapbox now.

Enjoy the clown!

Peace,

Bekka

Oh and if you love digital stamps and freebies, and you aren’t a regular reader of the Free Digital Stamps blog, you need to be! Every day you will find a list of links to digital freebies all over the internet (including here, of course, but tons of other places with artists much more talented than I!).

Tags: .jpg, 1900, animal, bw, children, clown, Cowardly Lion, daily public domain, digi-stamp, digi-stamps, digital stamp, digital stamps, Dorothy, DPD, fantasy, Glinda, Good Witch of the North, illustration, image, L. Frank Baum, lady, line drawing, lion, Munchkins, new items, new stamps, Oz, PD, png, public domain, Saturday Digital Feebie, scarecrow, SDF, stamp set, store new, Tin Woodman, Toto, Victorian, Wicked Witch of the West, William Wallace Denslow, witch, woman, Wonderful Wizard of Oz