Featured Details from the Belfast Bicentennial Doll Show Event at the Belfast Town Hall
In September, working with the Western NY Penn Doll Club BOFA cosponsored the Antique Toy and Doll Show and Sale. Vintage Finds Treasured Memories displayed and sold antique toys at the show. BOFA members Cecy Curcio, Kathy Garrison, Andrew Struckman, Brenda Sisson, Wende Kenyon, Marie Nix, Leah Burgess, Sharon Beiter, and Dylan Mattina generously contributed to the show and/or helped with setting up.
Belfast Organization
for Artists (BOFA)
presents
The Art of Collecting
by Kathy Garrison
As with all art, the creation of
something can be an inspiration for future creativity in many directions. The “something” created can take many forms,
including acquiring a collection of objects.
Today’s exhibit includes collections of old and new dolls and toys, and
even antique tools (see Joe Foley’s collection). Collections can be started from inherited
pieces, from a piece that intrigues the passerby, from interest in a deliberate
study or research, from a gift, or possibly, from an example to be studied for
creation of other items.
Toys:
1) The large toys in this exhibit are a fleet of trucks and tractors
from the 1950s. The 4 children who owned
them acquired most of them from their grandfather who was a long distance
trucker. These children are now
grandparents themselves. This is a
nostalgia collection and inspires fond memories of the people involved.
2) The doll houses have examples of ½”, 1:12, and larger scale
furniture (scaled to the size of the settings) and fall into 3 categories:
a) Play inspired by the series of classic books of the small Madeline having
various adventures in Paris, France. The
Madeline series is available through the Belfast Public Library. This house encourages the player to think of
further adventures for Madeline. The
Belfast Public Library, through interlibrary loan via the Southern Tier Library
System (STLS), found all of the Madeline books for this exhibit.
b) A very creative set of boxes that become a doll house or 2 doll
houses. Furniture and people are added
by the player and can take any form.
This doll house is all about creation of scenes, stories, and anything
else the player can think of.
c) The dollhouse player does not need walls or a roof to create scenes and
stories. The third setup is a sitting
room with appropriately sized dolls to inspire the player. The setting is defined by a paper square that
has a wood floor printed on it.
The Dolls in this exhibit fall
into several categories of collecting:
1) International – some of these dolls
were inherited pieces. They became core
pieces in growing collections of travel souvenirs. Some of the dolls were acquired for costume
study purposes and eventually inspired a doll couture business, some of the
dolls just appealed to the passerby and were acquired and kept. This exhibit involves multiple individual
collections.
2) Novelty – This is a miscellaneous collection
of folklore and fantasy dolls, toy bears, and other stuffed animals. Some of these items fall into the comfort
category for small children. Some are
designed to lean against a pillow on a bed and wait for bedtime. Some of the folkloric and fantasy pieces are
inspired by literary genres. There are
also several dolls that survived the childhoods of some of the collectors and
fall into the nostalgia category! There
are also several example dolls who were immensely popular over the last 60
years and became part of a whole franchise of associated items (alternate
clothing, doll houses, cars, stories, movies, and many other play aids.) One example is from the Barbie franchise
(Barbie and Ken) and the other is from the Story Book Dolls series
(Cinderella).
3) Couture and fashion dolls – Some of these dolls
were acquired for their costumes. Some
were acquired because they pleased the collector. Different eras of couture are represented. Many of these dolls were acquired for display
and were not suitable for casual play.
PICTURES COMING SOON!
