Parcheesi Board
Playing with Design: Gameboards, Art, and Culture, features over 100 handmade gameboards from the exuberant collection of Bruce and Doranna Wendel.
The exhibition includes early examples of classic games of Parcheesi, checkers, and chess, as well as hand-painted iterations of Monopoly and Chutes and Ladders made in the United States between the mid-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. Playing with Design is divided into thematic sections that explore ideas of history, culture, design, and craftsmanship within American game-playing. Some examples will evoke the familiarity of contemporary games, while others will give material shape to historical ideals, including morality, religion, patriotism, entrepreneurship and imagination. The gameboards on view will speak to underlying concepts of adventure and risk-taking as fundamental to American life, as seen through games organized around the themes of a train journey, a whaling expedition, or a trip around the world.
The exhibition will also explore the shift toward modernism at the turn of the twentieth century, relating the bold, geometric colors of hand-painted boards to the work of celebrated painters such as Piet Mondrian, Ellsworth Kelly and Jasper Johns.
Parcheesi Board, Late 19th century, Paint on wood, 17 1/2 x 16 3/4 in., Collection of Doranna and Bruce Wendel.
Shoot Out, Early 20th century, Paint on wood and linen, 12 x 11 1/2 in., Collection of Doranna and Bruce Wendel.
Parcheesi Board, Late 19th century, Inlaid wood, 19 1/2 x 19 1/4 in., American Folk Art Museum, Gift of Doranna and Bruce Wendel, 2024.7.1.
Possibly Alfred Cambell, Double-Sided Board in the Form of Book (The Sailor’s Bible), Possibly Gray, Maine, Mid- / late 19th century, Carved, inlaid, and painted wood, repurposed cigar box components, 14 x 11 in. American Folk Art Museum, Gift of Doranna and Bruce Wendel, 2024.7.13.
Game of the Goose, Mid- / late 19th century, Paint on wood, 16 x 15 3/4 in. American Folk Art Museum, Gift of Doranna and Bruce Wendel, 2024.7.4.