Elsie was raised and schooled in America, France, Spain and Italy and vowed in the sacred groves of Diana to become an artist while living in Italy on the shores of Lake Nemi. This was at a time when art and god were quite dead and the myths, mere shadows. Finding neither instruction nor understanding, but only ridicule and cynical prejudice, Elsie embarked on a course of self- study, learning the way of the old masters through deduction and observation and researching the beliefs of pre-Christian cultures, whom she believes were right all along. She was encouraged by her parents who were both master artists and enlightened philosophically and by Salvador Dali, a good friend of her family's.