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I was born in Lock Haven, Pennsylvania
beside the Susquehanna River on July 29
1938. As a youth I played in a beautiful
region scarred by early indiscriminate
logging and strip mining. I lived on a farm
with my parents and grandparents called
Orchard Hill located in Bald Eagle Valley in
the mountains of Central Pennsylvania. My
earliest recollection and puzzlement as a
child was not being allowed to go near or
swim in the shallow gentle water of the wide
River that so magnificently defined the area.
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"The water is unsafe" my mother said. "It is
because the banks of the river are leaking
raw sewage from the town and the closed
coal mines upstream are flooded and
leaching acids into the river" I was warned.
Pollution undetectable to the eye and
descriptions of microscopic toxins were a
strange wonderment to me as a small child. I
peered into a barren watery landscape, too
perfectly crystal clear looking for signs of
life, water plants and strider's, turtles,
beetles, snails. They were non existent!
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In my back yard I looked for diminished
quail, pheasant, wood ducks, red fox, it was
easier to find lichen, arrow heads, fossilized
shells, than the once abundant trailing
arbutus, and ground orchids. I became
gravely aware of endangered plants and
animals in the sparse felled woods,
abandoned fields, in the atrophic green
algae blooms in nearby Fishing Creek from
fertilizer and farm runoff. I learned at an
early age the importance of healthy
BIOS-systems and to respect and protect
the invisible and the visible and much
maligned bats, skunks, possums, snakes
and spiders.
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My grandparents on both sides had farms
with live stock, vegetable and flower
gardens. My mother was a zoologist with a
passionate interest in birds and American
shells and the microscopic. My father was
an outdoors man and naturalist. My family
spent a lot of time outdoors observing and
teaching. We explored flora and fauna in the
Pennsylvania woods, meadows, creeks and
river and in the early 50's the Florida Keys,
islands, hammocks and flats and reefs of the
Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico.
I attended 7th and 8th grade in a one room
school house in Marathon, Fl.
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We loved our principle and teacher Mr.
Guthrie. He focused lessons on the
surrounding natural world. He took us on
field trips to Miami to visit The Parrot Jungle,
Hass Serpeterium, and the Monkey Jungle. I
attended summer school at Penn State
University taking art history and painting
classes from famed art teacher Hobson
Pitman on loan each summer from the
Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts.
I graduated from the School of Architecture
and Design in 1961, with a B.S. in Design
from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor,
MI.
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I majored in painting at a time when abstract
expressionism was being taught and all my
instructors were male. I minored in ceramics.
After graduation I moved to in New York City
where I lived on the lower east side with
fellow artists and sold her work in several
Greenwich Village Art Galleries.
Wildlife artist George L. Schelling and I
opened an art gallery in Clinton, N.J. in the
late 60's.
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My paintings are of lessor known plants and
animals and BIOS systems. I described
myself as a patternist.
I won the National Academy of Design
Purchase award in late sixties for the Henry
Ward Ranger Fund for 24 x 30 watercolor
"Black Organic Form"
I moved to Key West, Florida in 1969 where I
remain today I opened an art gallery of
Botanical and Zoological Paintings in 1975
which continues to this day. I show antique
and contemporary environmental art.
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I have been a mentor to creative people for
35 years. By sharing my lifestyle, my
philosophy, my art, her home, guest cottage
and garden with creative people, visionary
thinkers, and naturalists. I have sought to
elevate the role of artists in society
especially environment artists and activate
humans to save what is left of the natural
world.
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I won the National Academy of Design
Purchase award in late sixties for the Henry
Ward Ranger Fund for 24 x 30 watercolor
"Black Organic Form"
I moved to Key West, Florida in 1969 where
she remains today she opened an art gallery
of Botanical and Zoological Paintings in
1975 which continues to this day. She
shows antique and contemporary
environmental art.
`
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Nancy has been a mentor to creative people
for 35 years. By sharing her lifestyle, her
philosophy, her art, her home, guest cottage
and garden with creative people, visionary
thinkers, and naturalists. She has sought to
elevate the role of artists in society
especially environment artists and activate
humans to save what is left of the natural
world.
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I have been a mentor to creative people for
35 years. By sharing my lifestyle, my
philosophy, my art, my home, guest cottage
and garden with creative people, visionary
thinkers, and naturalists. I have sought to
elevate the role of artists in society
especially environment artists and activate
humans to save what is left of the natural
world.
In 1993 I opened my home/studio to the
public . I fused art and life and performed
"routine maintenance" for visitors on a daily
basis This experience based on land ethic
came to be known as Nancy Forrester's
Secret Garden.
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Nancy is Creator and President of Mana
Project 501(c)(3) Mana is a Polynesian word
meaning positive creative force. Mana's
mission is to preserve a piece of Land Art
known as Nancy Forrester's Secret Garden
for the benefit of the earth, the arts, and the
artist. To serve the community and visiting
public as site dedicated to environmental
educational in order to create activists.
I currently live and work at my home/studio
in Key West, Florida
I am presently working on two books
Beauty with a Purpose, and Garden Games
and Extinction Jokes based on my
interaction with the public in Nancy
Forrester Secret Garden for a decade.)
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