Details

Title

Ferris Wheel

Artist/Maker

James Harold Jennings (American, 1931–1999)

Date

1980s

Medium

Paint on wood

Dimensions

40 × 37 × 5 inches

Credit

Gift of Phil and Lisa Gilbert

Accession #

2016.542

On View

On View - Stent Family Wing, Skyway, Gallery 404

James Harold Jennings transformed his property in Pinnacle, North Carolina, into an art environment to display his signs, sculptures, and embellished fences. Jennings fused Appalachian carving traditions with imagery drawn from popular culture, including National Geographic Magazine and drive-in movies. At the base of this kinetic sculpture, Jennings appears as a crowned figure, flanked by the Statue of Liberty and one of the old school buses he kept on his property. Although wind no longer blows his Ferris wheel into motion, Jennings’s use of high-contrast colored dots animates the sculpture through visual vibrations.

More from this Artist