No more hiding ‘I LOVE MY SCARS'

FLEUR’S ARTWORK IS SENDING OUT A BEAUTIFUL MESSAGE

- Fleur Guthrie

After enduring childhood taunts for being “ugly” and cruelly nicknamed “bulldog” by classmates for having a flat nose, Fleur Wickes grew into a teenager who would hide her face when talking to boys.

Born with a full cleft lip and palate – and needing numerous operations to reconstruct her nose and lips – she quietly took on her own brutal self-critique.

But at 20, Fleur didn’t want to do that any more and made a decision to look in the mirror every day for a year and tell herself she was beautiful.

“It actually worked!” says the Whanganui-based artist, whose emotive word paintings stem from finding beauty in the dark places.

“One man I dated told me, ‘You’d look really pretty if you didn’t have scars. Have you thought about having surgery for them?’ In that moment, I knew all the work I had done in the mirror had helped because I was able to reply, ‘No, I actually like them.’ I realised how far I had come.

“Everyone has something to deal with, but a lot of the time it’s hidden. I didn’t have that option.”

Growing up as the youngest of six kids, with parents who ran the local pub at UÌ„pokongaro, outside of Whanganui, Fleur credits her fiercely-protective mum Colleen with teaching her to stand up for herself.