“Woody’s Last Laugh” presented by Gevurtz
Symposium:
Session Title:
- More Than Human (artist talks)
Presentation Title:
- Woody's Last Laugh
Presentation Subtheme:
- Resilient stories
Presenter(s):
Venue(s):
Abstract:
The piece, “Woody’s Last Laugh: Gone for All Seasons” is a video project built around the disturbing fact that the iconic cartoon character, “Woody the Woodpecker,” was modeled on the now probably extinct ivory-billed woodpecker found in the Southeast United States. There has been no confirmed sight-ing of an ivory-billed woodpecker since 1944 and it is only by virtue of occasional unconfirmed reported sightings that the species has not been removed from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife’s Endangered Species List as extinct.
In this video, Woody is removed from his 1941 film “Pantry Panic”—made only 3 years before the last undisputed recorded sighting of the ivory-billed woodpecker in the wild. The ani-mation is otherwise unaltered. In addition to removing the images of Woody, the soundtrack of the animation is edited to remove Woody’s iconic and very identifiable laugh. Thus, silence is left where Woody would have otherwise had his dialogue, much like the silence in the trees left by the ivory-billed woodpecker’s probable extinction.
