Fairy tales, monsters, and the genetic imagination

Mark Scala, Suzanne Anker

Abstract: "This catalog explores the psychological and social implications contained in the hybrid creatures and fantastic scenarios created by contemporary artists whose works will appear in the exhibition 'Fairy Tales, Monsters, and the Genetic Imagination,' which opens at Nashville's Frist Center for the Visual Arts in February 2012. Curator Mark Scala's introductory essay focuses on anthropomorphism in the mythology, folklore, and art of many cultures as it contrasts with the dominant Western view of human exceptionalism. Scala also provides an art historical context, linking the visual fabulists of today to artists of the Romantic, Symbolist, and Surrealist periods who sought to transcend oppositions such as rationality and intuition, fear and desire, the physical and the spiritual. Discussing how artists adapt traditional stories to give mythic form to the very real dilemmas of...