Forest Folklore: A Multisensory Experience

December 5, 2015 – February 21, 2016

An entirely tactile fairy-tale forest is the site-specific creation of Colorado-based artist Ann Cunningham. Visitors are encouraged to touch the artworks, which will inform all about the needs of those who use other senses “to see.”

Exhibition Highlights

Ann Cunningham, Wynken, Blynken, & Nod, 2004, slate, bronze, gold and silver leaf, cherry wood, and steel. One of three men in a boat pulls a net containing three fish from the water while the man in the moon looks on from the star-filled sky.
Ann Cunningham, Consternation, 2015, slate, limestone, cork, and raffia. The central focus of this image is the black slate bird spreading her wings to encompass to her three limestone eggs held within a braided raffia nest. The leaves and vines twining around the outside of the black slate frame give the impression that the nest is being held up by tree branches. The sky, made of cork, is in the background.
Ann Cunningham, Golden Goose Panel #1, 2000, slate, bronze, gold leaf, cherry wood. In this image, the wooden house on the left is surrounded by our hero's family. Ma is directly in front of the house with her hands on her hips and a wooden rolling pin in her hand. She does not look happy. The oldest son is holding his bandaged arm in front of him and beside him stands the little brother leaning on a crutch supporting his bandaged right leg. Pa, clearly annoyed with our hero, is brandishing a stick as our hero walks away along a path into the woods to seek his fortune.
Ann Cunningham, Golden Goose Panel #2, 2000, slate, bronze, gold leaf, cherry wood. Our hero, once he enters the wood, finds the little man and offers to share his lunch. Our hero seated on tree stump with his axe on the ground in front of him is on the left and the little man is in the middle of the picture. The path emerges from the forest in the upper left-hand corner, curves down the middle of the picture and around a tree and back up to the inn in the upper right. The golden goose is hidden in the roots at the base of the tree.
Ann Cunningham, Golden Goose Panel #3, 2000, slate, bronze, gold leaf, cherry wood. This image shows the farmer's fields. Carrots are growing in rows in the lower left. In the lower right are heads of cabbage. Eight people are parading on the trail through the middle of the picture, one stuck to the other and led by our hero holding the golden goose.
Ann Cunningham, Golden Goose Panel #4, 2000, slate, bronze, gold leaf, cherry wood. This image depicts a wooden village on the left and a stone castle on the right. A trail from the upper left-hand corner emerges from the farmer's fields and curves in front of the wooden village and ends at the gates of the castle. Many people are looking out of their homes' windows. A long line of eight people including our hero carrying the golden goose wind their way into town and up to the castle where the princess sees this merry band and begins to laugh, breaking the spell. Townspeople looking onto the scene begin to laugh, too.
Ann Cunningham, Golden Goose Panel #5, 2000, slate, bronze, gold leaf, cherry wood. In the lower right-hand corner, the princess and our hero are married as the king looks on from his crenelated castle wall and the little man stands at the wheel of a wooden ship that sails upon the land. The golden goose, in the upper right-hand corner, flies off into the distance.
Ann Cunningham, Sequence, 2015, slate
Ann Cunningham, Wolf Pack, 2014, slate

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