BGuthrie Photos: TN -- Nashville -- Cheekwood Botanical Garden and Museum of Art -- Carell Woodland Sculpture Trail

TN -- Nashville -- Cheekwood Botanical Garden and Museum of Art -- Carell Woodland Sculpture Trail:

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Description of Pictures: Carell Woodland Sculpture Trail
The Carell Woodland Sculpture Trail is a unique attraction among American art museums - a place where contemporary sculpture by internationally recognized artists is integrated into reclaimed woodland. Its wood-chip paths are rugged and stretch more than one mile. The area is being restored by removing invasive exotic plants and reintroducing native species. Eastern red cedar, black locust and hackberry - all tolerant of shallow soils - give way to hickory, oak, black cherry, ash and persimmon. As you walk the trail, experience the synthesis of art and nature.

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Copyrights: All pictures were taken by amateur photographer Bruce Guthrie (me!) who retains copyright on them. Free for non-commercial use with attribution. See the [Creative Commons] definition of what this means. "Photos (c) Bruce Guthrie" is fine for attribution. (Commercial use folks including AI scrapers can of course contact me.) Feel free to use in publications and pages with attribution but you don't have permission to sell the photos themselves. A free copy of any printed publication using any photographs is requested. Descriptive text, if any, is from a mixture of sources, quite frequently from signs at the location or from official web sites; copyrights, if any, are retained by their original owners.

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[1] CHEEKC_140527_002.JPG	[2] CHEEKC_140527_007.JPG	[3] CHEEKC_140527_011.JPG
[4] CHEEKC_140527_015.JPG	[5] CHEEKC_140527_018.JPG	[6] CHEEKC_140527_029.JPG
[7] CHEEKC_140527_038.JPG	[8] CHEEKC_140527_043.JPG	[9] CHEEKC_140527_049.JPG
[10] CHEEKC_140527_054.JPG	[11] CHEEKC_140527_058.JPG	[12] CHEEKC_140527_060.JPG
[13] CHEEKC_140527_067.JPG	[14] CHEEKC_140527_074.JPG	[15] CHEEKC_140527_076.JPG
[16] CHEEKC_140527_079.JPG	[17] CHEEKC_140527_081.JPG	[18] CHEEKC_140527_084.JPG
[19] CHEEKC_140527_089.JPG	[20] CHEEKC_140527_092.JPG	[21] CHEEKC_140527_099.JPG
[22] CHEEKC_140527_103.JPG	[23] CHEEKC_140527_106.JPG	[24] CHEEKC_140527_110.JPG
[25] CHEEKC_140527_115.JPG	[26] CHEEKC_140527_120.JPG	[27] CHEEKC_140527_126.JPG
[28] CHEEKC_140527_129.JPG	[29] CHEEKC_140527_132.JPG	[30] CHEEKC_140527_135.JPG
[31] CHEEKC_140527_138.JPG	[32] CHEEKC_140527_144.JPG	[33] CHEEKC_140527_149.JPG
[34] CHEEKC_140527_152.JPG	[35] CHEEKC_140527_155.JPG	[36] CHEEKC_140527_160.JPG
[37] CHEEKC_140527_165.JPG	[38] CHEEKC_140527_171.JPG	[39] CHEEKC_140527_174.JPG
[40] CHEEKC_140527_180.JPG	[41] CHEEKC_140527_182.JPG	[42] CHEEKC_140527_192.JPG
[43] CHEEKC_140527_194.JPG	[44] CHEEKC_140527_197.JPG	[45] CHEEKC_140527_199.JPG
[46] CHEEKC_140527_204.JPG	[47] CHEEKC_140527_206.JPG	[48] CHEEKC_140527_209.JPG

Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. CHEEKC_140527_007.JPG: Crawling Lady Hare, Sophie Ryder, 1997 Extraordinary creatures inhabit worlds of fantasy. We may expect art to show what is real - but who is to say our visions and dreams are not?
2. CHEEKC_140527_029.JPG: High-Back Windharp Chairs, Doug Hollis The wire strands make an aeolian harp to capture the music of the winds. Go beyond merely what you hear - the hum of vibrating strings or the ambient sounds of the forest - sit in the chairs and feel like a child as your feet dangle below.
3. CHEEKC_140527_038.JPG: "The Order Of The Present Is The Disorder Of The Future" - SAINT-JUST, Ian Hamilton Finlay Carved in the Latin script of Ancient Rome, the phrase by the French revolutionary Louis-Antoine Léon Saint-Just recalls in ruins the mortality of great civilizations.
4. CHEEKC_140527_049.JPG: Blue Pesher, James Turrell "Pesher" is an ancient Hebrew word meaning, "to comment upon." In this room, discover a commentary on the heavens. Enter the chamber, sit, look up and reflect. The longer you stay, the more sensitive your perceptions will become.
5. CHEEKC_140527_074.JPG: Tree Poem, John Scott Based on the shape of real trees in this forest, branch-like patterns gently play off the woven complexity of the natural form behind them. When light reflects off the shiny, textured surfaces, the motionless aluminum branches seem to wave in the wind.
6. CHEEKC_140527_089.JPG: One Line Horizontal Floating - Twenty Feet, George Rickey Like a javelin soaring through the air, or the needle of a compass turning gently to the motion of the breeze, this moving line of metal makes material the unseen forces of nature. At certain times of day, the sun's bright rays seem to make the form disappear, dissolving it into a fine strip of magnificent light.
7. CHEEKC_140527_099.JPG: Cheekwood Prime Matter, Eric Orr Ancient philosophers believed the universe was made entirely of prime matter: Earth, Air, Fire and Water. In these materials lay the secret of human life, spirit and nature. This gateway was designed to mark the entrance to the Carell Woodland Sculpture Trail.
8. CHEEKC_140527_106.JPG: Untitled, Ulrich Rückreim This block of granite was split into five pieces without erasing the marks made lifting it from the quarry. The two flat, manmade corners call attention to the gracious curves of the natural stone and resonant beauty of its rich color.
9. CHEEKC_140527_115.JPG: Steeple Dance, Frank Morbillo These lofty spires seen to reach for the sky, yet appear to cave inward, as though nature is reclaiming them. The steel is intended to rust into a rich, orange patina that stands out beautifully from the deep green cedar trees all around.
10. CHEEKC_140527_129.JPG: Turtle, Two Hares, Frog and Hawk, Frank Fleming Creatures of the forest gather as though assembled for a community meeting. Notice their lively, almost human expressions. And by all means, don't miss the hawk!
11. CHEEKC_140527_165.JPG: Girdled Figure, Tom Czarnopys To "girdle" a tree is to cut its bark. When the bark can no longer draw nutrients from its roots, the tree dies. The figure in the tree was cast from the artist's own body, giving the sculpture an almost human soul.
12. CHEEKC_140527_180.JPG: Glass Bridge, Siah Armajani More than 500 years ago the great glassblowers of Murano, Italy, tried to build a glass bridge over the Grand Canal in Venice. Sadly, the sparkling gem collapsed into the lagoon, not to be recreated - until now. Sculpture today may be more than an object to behold; experience the magic of passing through this remarkable creation.
13. CHEEKC_140527_199.JPG: A Memorial To The Aboriginal People Of This Land Who Lived In With These Forests, Yoné Sinor Native Americans traversed these forests long before Europeans arrived. Houses were built with upright logs. Hearths kept the homes warm. The dead were honored with sculptures buried in their graves and prayers were offered to heaven on feathers tied to the branches of trees.
14. CHEEKC_140527_204.JPG: Untitled (In A Dream), Jenny Holzer Read. Sit. Look. Imagine. "In a dream you saw a way to survive and you were full of joy"
Wikipedia Description: Cheekwood Botanical Garden and Museum of Art
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cheekwood is a privately funded 55 acre estate on the western edge of Nashville, Tennessee that houses the Cheekwood Botanical Garden and Museum of Art. Formerly the residence of Nashville's Cheek family, the 30,000-square-foot (2,800 m²) Georgian-style mansion was opened as a museum in 1960.

The house that coffee built:

Christopher Cheek founded a wholesale grocery business in Nashville in the 1880s. His son, Leslie Cheek, joined him as a partner, and by 1915 was president of the family-owned company. Leslie's wife, Mabel Wood, was a member of a prominent Clarksville family. Meanwhile, Joel Cheek, Leslie's cousin, had developed an acclaimed blend of coffee that was marketed through Nashville's finest hotel, the Maxwell House Hotel. Legend has it that Theodore Roosevelt proclaimed the blend "Good to the last drop," which is still a registered trademark for the product. Cheek's extended family, including Leslie and Mabel Cheek, were investors. In 1928, the Postum Cereals Company (now General Foods) purchased Maxwell House's parent company, Cheek-Neal Coffee, for more than $40 million.

With their income secured by the proceeds from the sale, Leslie Cheek bought 100 acres (0.40 km²) of what was then woodland in West Nashville for a country estate. He hired New York residential and landscape architect, Bryant Fleming, and gave him control over every detail - from landscaping to interior furnishings. The result was a limestone mansion and extensive formal gardens inspired by the grand English manors of the 18th century. Fleming's masterpiece, Cheekwood, was completed in 1932.

Leslie and Mabel Cheek and their daughter, Huldah Cheek Sharp, lived at Cheekwood until the 1950s when it was offered as a site for a botanical garden and art museum.

The development of the property was spearheaded by the Exchange Club of Nashville, the Horticultural Society of Middle Tennessee and many other civic groups. The Nashville Museum of Art donated its permanent collections and proceeds from the sale of its building to the effort. The new Cheekwood museum opened to the public in 1960.

Art Museum:

Cheekwood’s art collection was founded in 1959 upon the holdings of the former Nashville Museum of Art. The core holdings include broad collections of American art; American and British decorative arts; contemporary art, especially outdoor sculpture acquired for the Woodland Sculpture Trail.

Cheekwood’s American art collection includes 600 paintings and 5,000 prints, drawings and photographs. The collection, assembled in the 1980s and early 1990’s through a multi-million dollar bequest, spans the history of American art. Its strength centers on The Eight. Other strengths include the world's largest collection of sculptures of William Edmondson, photographs by Louise Dahl-Wolfe, and a vast variety of post-Second World War prints. Recently, the Museum has pursued a consciously focused acquisition process, having added paintings by James Hamilton, William Bradford, and new contemporary sculpture for the Trail.

The core holdings of the decorative arts collection include the third-largest Worcester porcelain in the United States, and a 650-piece silver collection, spanning the 18th-20th centuries.

The Cheek Mansion is itself considered part of the collection. The renovation restored much of the original building, revealing authentic features (wood and marble floors that had been carpeted), and conserving historical architectural motifs, such as the illusionist murals that line the main corridor.

The Contemporary Art collection, housed in the galleries created out of the estate’s original garage and stables, is small but of high quality, including paintings by Larry Rivers, Andy Warhol, Robert Ryman, and Red Grooms. Additionally, seven small galleries were created in the old horse stable stalls to enable Cheekwood to display installation art.

The Carrell Woodland Sculpture Trail, a collection of fifteen sculptures by international artists, extends the contemporary art collection into nature, focusing on a kind of intimate, outdoor art not commonly found in American museums.

Botanical Garden:

Extending across the grounds from the Museum of Art, the Botanical Garden encompasses the entire 55 acre site with an emphasis on display, education, and study. The plant collections include boxwood, conifer, crape myrtle, daffodil, daylily, dogwood, fern, herb, holly, hosta, hydrangea, Japanese maple, magnolia, Southeastern US natives, redbud, and trillium.

Visitors to Cheekwood will enjoy many styles of garden design. An avenue of crape myrtles leads into the Robertson Ellis Color Garden where sweeping curves of colorful flowers border a sloping lawn with a beautiful view of the distant hills. As visitors exit this garden, they pass under eight curved aches covered with colorful vines and planted with a variety of annuals and perennials. Next visitors will enter the Japanese Garden. This is a quiet place for rest and meditation, a refuge from the outside world. The Wills Perennial garden displays new and traditional perennials and includes a steep limestone wall that provides habitat and background for this colorful, full-sun garden. The Martin Boxwood Garden was designed and built by landscape architect Bryant Fleming in the late 1920’s with terraced gardens and extensive plantings of boxwood. This formal garden invites the visitor to be transported to a different era. The Howe Wildflower garden, spectacular in the spring, is a woodland wildflower garden that was originally at the East Nashville home of Cora Howe. This garden was moved to Cheekwood in 1968 along with its stone tool shed, rock wall, and garden ornaments. As visitors move through the gardens, they will next encounter the Burr Terrace Garden. This is an enclosed cottage garden on three levels with many pastel colored perennials, annuals, and shrubs. Exiting the Burr Terrace Garden, visitors will enter the Carell Dogwood Garden. This garden displays many variations in branching patterns, bark, leaf, berry, and the showy bracts characteristic of dogwoods. The Herb Study Garden displays many plants to be touched and smelled, in addition to plants that can be used for cooking, fragrance, dyes, fibers, and cosmetics. Finally, guests will come to the Turner Seasons Garden. This garden focuses on the seasonal aspect of gardens in Tennessee. It features a series of garden rooms, each highlighting a different season with plant collections of special interest

The gardens and collections not only serve to educate, but also to please each visitor’s sense of aesthetic. The gardens are an important horticultural resource for the entire region.

Other attractions:

In addition to the Museum and the Botanical Garden, Cheekwood operates a gift shop, and a restaurant called the Pineapple Room which overlooks the greenery of the elegant west lawn.
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