A red bandana holds back her hair as Angie Froke diligently examines her four-foot-by-six-foot canvas. With tired eyes, she puts the final brushstrokes on the curvaceous figure of Scurvy Girl, a savvy pirate heroine she created for her new art series of swashbuckling adventures. It’s time to go grab a beer and celebrate the evening pirate-style with some good ol’ drunken debauchery. As her white Ford pickup pulls away, a bumper sticker warns all ye who dare travel behind her vessel: “Walk the Plank, Bitch.”

From Johnny Depp’s swaggering Captain Jack Sparrow to Gwen Stefani shaking her bountiful booty in the video “Rich Girl,” pirates have pushed their way to the forefront of popular culture over the past few years. For twentysomethings, maybe it began with the “Goonies’” hunt for One-Eyed Willie’s treasure. Or perhaps it even goes back further to Long John Silver or Captain Hook. Whatever the inspiration, these dirty scoundrels have raped and pillaged their way into modern art, music and fashion, hoisting their sails to ride the wave of the current trend.

“She’s been a character inside my head for years,” Froke says of “Scurvy Girl,” which premieres at Unity Skate Shop in Livermore on Dec. 3. “She’s really who I want my alter ego to be.”

Froke, a history buff of these crooks of the sea, believes pirates’ criminal pasts swab the poop deck of their popularity. “A pirate has a blatant disrespect for all imposed authority,” she says. “And Hollywood has created this romantic idea of what a pirate is.”

“When most people think of pirates, they think of their childhood,” says Walter Askew, singer of Salty Walt and the Rattlin' Ratlines, a folk group that performs traditional sea chanteys at the Edinburgh Castle in San Francisco. The appeal of the pirate, according to Askew, comes from the nomadic lifestyle and the counterculture they developed in the early 18th century. “It’s the romance of traveling the sea, the ideas of exploration” he says. “But really, pirates were criminals who were out for themselves.”

Today’s youth are armed with striped shirts, bandanas on their heads and skulls 'n' crossbones painted on the back of their studded leather jackets. Pretty soon, 13-year-old buccaneers will be sporting diamond-studded eye patches and talking parrots will be the new hip accessory. And if parents find tattoos and nose piercings threatening, just wait, me hearties, for pirate-style body modification: hooks for hands and pegs for legs.

“We didn’t set out to start a trend,” says Steve Morales, founder of PirateMod.com, a Web-based clothing company that offers a wide selection of originally-designed pirate gear. Since its beginning in Petaluma three years ago, business has been growing steadily and, according to Morales, multiplied by 10 times overnight after the release of “Pirates of the Caribbean.” “It’s like Disney set out to advertise for us!” he says.

“Pirates combine elements of fear and attraction,” says professional pirate Mark “Cap’n Slappy” Summers, co-creator of “International Talk Like a Pirate Day,” which takes place Sept. 19. “Pirates tug at the part of our souls that longs for adventure.”

Summers and his partner in crime, John “Ol’ Chumbucket” Baur, authors of “Pirattitude! So You Wanna Be a Pirate? Here’s How!” adhere to the pirate code, and support these salty dogs as pop culture icons. “It’s all about the inner swagger, the growl,” says Baur. “Historian Marcus Rediker called pirates ‘the freest people on Earth’ and we encourage people to emulate that freedom, with no excuses and no apologies.”

For now, the pirate’s life seems suited for many, and these rebellious scallywags don’t appear to be walking the popularity plank anytime soon. “Arrr!” says Froke with a chuckle. “That’s all I can say!”