Fairy Tale Resurgence | Art & Design | The Slavs are all right at Schema : more than ethnic

Fairy Tale Resurgence | Art & Design | The Slavs are all right

There's a decidedly fairy tale 'moment' happening in art & design right now, and we don't mean the cutesy Disney variety, neither. Rather, woodland creatures, anthropomorphic animalia, laser cut wood, and graphic art design reminiscent of various Eastern European folk traditions have begun to pop up here and there, often with the sinister undertones of traditional fairy tales intact.

From a G&M article on fairy tale elements in design to programming at the recent signal & noise media arts festival in Vancouver, the wolves (and foxes and bears and squirrels ... vicious things) are among us. (Not to mention all the indie bands with "Wolf" in their names, but that's a whole different post.)

The emergence of these art and design elements that hearken back to pagan European and pan-historic folk mythology right now is interesting, what with the global recession / death of paper / mass move to digital / sky is falling / literal 'wolf at the door' for many industries - and families. There's also notes of the green/environmental movement and our ambivalent relationship with animals. And perhaps there's a nascent appreciation for beautiful, intricate objects made of paper, wood, or clay when most of us are surrounded by cold, ugly electronics all day?

One hopes. A read on thefancy.ca, blog of CBCR3 producer Andrea Gin, alerted us to the recent launch of Pohadky (Drawn&Quarterly) at Lucky's Comics in Vancouver; a gorgeous graphic book by Marek Colek and Pat Shewchuk steeped in Czech and Ukrainian folk legends. Together, Pat and Marek are Tin Can Forest, artists inspired by localism, environmentalism, the urban environment and Slavic folk culture. Their pictures are intricate, sly, haunting, silly, sexy, and demand a second and third look to see what detail(s) you missed the first time. Visit them online, and be sure to check out their animation gallery. The Pohadky promo spot is quite delicious.

More: Fairy tales for scary times in the Globe and Mail, though you'll have to find the print version for the graphics| Studio Job works in paper/bronze/wood/clay at Moss, NY | signal & noise media arts festival | Steve Mazza anthropomorphic sculptures at Transit Gallery | Tin Can Forest: Pat Shewchuk and Marek Colek art & animation | henderson dry goods laser cut wooden jewellry & loveliness | Geoffrey Pugen's Utopics

Left: Geoffrey Pugen, Utopics. Courtesy of Angell Gallery, Toronto

From the signal & noise artist's page on Geoffrey Pugen's Utopics:

The digital age has given humans the ability to extend and modify their identity via cyberspace. In response to this new cultural climate, people are returning to metaphors of the 'animal' and the 'natural' to investigate the character of our post-millennial environment. Theorists like Haraway have examined how we project our desires onto animals: as noble ideals, as sentimental fantasies, as repositories of evil, as the sublime or the abyss.