I’m Nancy Forrester. Painter, Ceramicist, Photographer, Site Specific Artist, Performance Artist, Creator of Nancy Forrester's Secret Garden, Key West Parrot Sanctuary, Educator and Storyteller and AI Artist based in Key West, Florida.
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Hello, I am glad you are here.
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Artist Nancy Forrester performing Storytelling with the help of "Baby" Hyacinth macaw, Mr Peaches, Moluccan cockatoo and Ratchet, Buffons macaw |
Dear visitors, as a professional artist, previous painter and gallery owner, now educator, storyteller and net artist working for the health and welfare of orphaned parrots, I have been asked many times by my patrons to write a book about my life. Writing a book about my life has never been a priority. Now it is. On Feb. 4, 2012, I got a very unpleasant surprise. I was cited by Key West's City zoning department for not having the proper license for what I have been doing in Key West for the past 28 years and possibly as long as 45 years. I am fearful I will be permanently stopped from doing the work I love. I am losing sleep over it. This licensing issue which has dragged on for ten months has the potential to close my door to the public for good, end the important work I do and prohibit me from making a living. I feel scared and undervalued in the vast hustle and bustle of Key West's Tourist Industry and its push for the dollar. I feel like a forgotten, inconsequential powerless person. This licensing issue can potentially eclipse my entire history and snuff out the value of my life's work. I remember how I felt when I lost my site-specific art project Nancy Forrester's Secret Garden (the last undeveloped wooded acre of land in the heart of old town Key West). It was lost because it did not receive the interest and financial support it deserved. I gave it my all for many years to save it from development. It went into foreclosure in 2008. The trees were cut down and the land built upon. To see my Land Art Project, go to my Portfolio on this site select Nancy Forrester's Secret Garden. To help ward off my fear now (at times panic) of losing my ability to work and not being clearly understood, I decided to build a website with the story of my life as a form NET ART. using my musings and photos to create a "Selfie" in an attempt to define what I do and help "Me" make a self-evaluation of the strides I have made in life. It is to chronicle my growth and change as an artist over time. This project will include my autobiography, memoirs, essays, artist statement, my portfolio and an interactive blog The four writing formats I will use to tell my story are different in focus. My Autobiography is a non-fiction account of my life, what happened in my past written in chronological order, where I was born, places lived, schooling. college, marriage and transforming people and events. etc. My Memoirs will tend to discuss past events with the focus on striking or life changing events. My Artist Statement defines my unwavering mission as an environment artist. My Essays will be about almost anything. My Portfolio contains my early work (paintings) photographs, tiles, land art, present-day performance art (storytelling) and net art. My portfolio will depict my growth over time and my use of different artistic mediums and disciplines. I stopped making objects of art in 1985 for environmental reasons and began performance and storytelling. For the past 28 years I have sought to co-create with others as often as possible, so it is in this spirit I share this summation of myself with you. The site will be changing and evolving as I add words, pictures and videos. Hopefully my blog will attract bloggers and my tradition of interactive art will continue. |
If you have read thus far
thank you for your interest
The people I am about to mention, have a profound influence on me and my art. My mother Nancy Forrester Clapp and my father Richard Shaw Quigley, Jr. (both parents were defenders of the conservation of natural resources), Mr. Guthrie head master of my one room school house where I attended 7th and 8th grade in Marathon, FL in the 50's, Rachael Carlson's book the Silent Spring, David Abram's book The Spell of the Sensuous, Joseph Campbell's book Power of the Myth, Bill McKibbon's book, The End of Nature, Judy Chicago's exhibit and book The Dinner Table, New Site-specific Art in Charleston, SC, the Spoleto Festival 1991, curated by Mary Jane Jacob, Derek Jarmin's Garden, Jarmin was a filmmaker, writer and icon of his day, Jarman explores through an exquisite diary of his garden the nature of art, politics, life and death. Al Gore, An Inconvenient Truth, film maker Gregory Colber's "Ashes and Snow", Musician Leon Russell "A Song for You", Musicians Pink Floyd the album The Wall and Greta Thunberg, a young Swedish environmental activist who is known for challenging world leaders to take immediate action for climate change mitigation by saying "YOUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE"
Joseph Cambell says, "Artists are the shamans of the post-modern world and there is only one thing for them to do, save the natural world."
I’m a woman artist with a passion to save
what is left of the our precious natural world
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I am an environment artist and a sustainability activist. The subjects of my early work (paintings) are of lessor known plants and animals and their bio systems. I am a patternist. I am interested in three-dimensionality. I have always been fascinated by re-occurring patterns in nature. Bringing attention to and protecting Earth's plants and animals and Earth's failing biosystems, has always been the subject of my art regardless of the medium used. In my early work, I choose subjects of interest that were often maligned, creatures like rats, bats, spiders, scorpions and scary things like "snakes and snails and puppy dog tails" I wanted people to understand that every creature big or small has a part to play in the health of nature as a whole. I painted lessor known organisms like British Solders and Ladder Lichens that are neither plants or animals. I was fascinated by microscopic life including aeroplankton. I painted one cell animals like paramecium and ciliate stentors. A stentor is a sedentary trumpet-shaped single-celled animal that is widespread in fresh water. I painted fresh water plankton and oceanic plankton, I painted the patterns found in cross sections of plant life made visible by the electron microscope.
I have used many mediums and artistic disciplines over the course of my lifetime to create a wider audience for my message "Understand, Appreciate and Help Save the Natural World." All of my art is inspired by science and the beauty and complexity of Earth's living systems. In 1993 I opened Nancy Forrester's Secret Garden. This Land Art centered on saving the last wooded acre of undeveloped land in the heart of historic old town Key West from being lost to development, it was then I began to use Performance and the Art of Storytelling to save the land and stop the abuse of overbred parrots created by the pet trade. The orphaned parrots that were abandoned in the Secret Garden are life's greatest gift to me! By telling their complex stories, I help prevent parrot abuse. |
"How did you get into parrots?" People often ask!
I opened Nancy Forrester's Secret Garden in 1993 Because people saw it as large green rainforest like space they offered me their unwanted animals thinking it was an appropriate place for them I was offered monkeys, mynah birds, parrots, turtles, snakes and iguanas. I said NO to all because I do not believe in the exotic animal trade. I do not believe in capturing animals in the wild or breeding them in captivity to sell for money. I said NO because I did not want to become a zoo and because I believe animals belong in the wild with their own kind. Humans need to protect their natural habitats. I never wanted a parrot and I knew very little about them. I believe parrots should not be caged but flying free with their own kind in their countries of origin. The first parrot showed up abandoned in my garden in 1993. Someone unknown to me left a parrot in a cage inside my gate. They successfully snuck it in and abandon it when no one was looking. When you are open to the public and everyone sees you have a parrot a tsunami of unwanted parrots follow. Abused and abandoned parrots entered my life. They turned out to be a gift. The parrots helped strengthen my environmental message to the public. I offer Storytelling and teach Parrot 101 to the visiting public on the birds behalf. My aim is to create empathy for them and stop parrot abuse. I help humans see more than their beautiful plumage and the romanticized lore that surrounds them. I want the birds recognized for the complex, intelligent, long lived moody creatures that they are. I stress adopt do not shop. Inviting the public to participate in my Storytelling and my Educational Events like "Parrot 101" provides the funds that enable me to give the parrots the best possible care when it come to nutrition, housing, supplies, toys, training and veterinary care. |
Nancy Forrester with "Larrybird" Harlequin macaw photo by artist Steve Lohman
As a professional artist who has tried numerous mediums to impart my environment message, I am the happiest I have ever been using the Art of Storytelling on the subject of parrots. With help from parrots discarded by former owners, I have finally found my niche in life and perfected my craft. Now, near the end of my life, I have the largest audience of my career, made up of people who are interested in my stories. I have observed and studied parrot husbandry parrots for 29 years. Parrots have taught me how they think and why they act the way they do. I am their caregiver and attend to their needs and I train them. Training is of ultimate value in understanding them. Today they are the light of my life. Everyday I learn something new from them. I repay the favor and teach them how not to just live but to thrive in captivity. They offer me companionship, love, joy, laughter and play. Their individual history's, social antics and creative behavior contribute to great storytelling. The Moral of My Story is "Stop Abuse"! "Adopt, Don't Shop", "Educate yourself before bringing a parrot home"! "Parrot 101", "Polly Want A Cracker", and "Beautiful"!
Thank you for your interest
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