Janice Wright Cheney

To trace the forests wild 2021
Site-specific installation / Installation in situ
Site 8 – Ryan Premises / Établissement- Ryan, Hanger à sel, Bonavista

Sardinia 2016
Site-specific video installation / Installation vidéo in situ
Site 13 – Mockbeggar Big Store, Bonavista

To trace the forests wild is the most recent of Janice Wright Cheney’s many textiles-based investigations of humans’ relationships with nature. It continues her Fera Moira series, a positive vision of a future where ecological life heals itself of human-inflicted wounds. “Rewilding” is an expanding conservation approach that largely allows nature to take its own course in remediating eco-systems. British scientist George Monbiot has noted that this is the opposite of the Western biblical tradition of “dominion” over nature (transposed to the New World by colonists). The installation is an intricate representation of a forest floor: leaves exquisitely crafted from vintage linens; a “fairy ring” of felted wool; livid pinkgill mushrooms; strands of mycelia … reflecting hidden systems and processes that renew the earth and thus forests. A little folklore and fun is mixed in: here gloves; there an antler fragment or a few crystals; and, presiding over all, an Arctic hare in its winter coat. Hares and rabbits have multiple meanings across cultures, including abundance, cleverness and good luck. Fairy rings are magic spaces, home to fairies, elves and witches, though dangerous for humans.

Wright Cheney’s immersive video installation, Sardinia, at the Big Store of the 18th century Mockbeggar Plantation, enveloped viewers in darting schools of silvery fish and mesmerizing sound. Originally commissioned for an Eastport, Maine event, it references destruction of the Fundy coast’s once abundant sardine fishery. Its resonance in Newfoundland is obvious. 

PG