House (“The Lodge”)
A remarkable house made of reclaimed timber, some from an old distillery, some hauled out of the Mississippi after a century under water.
History about Yellow Bird
Yellow Bird Farm was purchased in 2002, and the adjoining property (The Lodge) was added in Spring 2008.
The site itself has a many-layered history. The pervasive limestone reflects the time when it was a shallow inland sea. Coral fossils from 450 million years ago are common. There is evidence of Native American presence (arrowheads) and a nearby Civil War camp
YELLOW BIRD a 501 (c) 3 non-profit
Yellow Bird is a 175 acre art farm, sculpture park, wildlife sanctuary, organic garden and meditation retreat being developed near Woodbury, Tennessee, USA, 60 minutes from Nashville. Exhibitions of outdoor sculpture and earth art by local, national, and (with luck) international sculptors are being planned. Short residencies are available to artists to construct work on site, on a scale more substantial, and with a topography more varied than nearby Cheekwood’s Sculpture Trail, or Chattanooga’s Sculpture Garden. Their work will be exhibited in the (virtual) Wild Goat Gallery. The sculpture park itself aspires loosely to be a Gesamtkustwerk.
Yellow Bird is located in Woodbury, TN, one of the top 100 Small Arts Towns in America (John Villani, The 100 Best Small Art Towns in America, Avalon, 1998), home to Cannon County Arts Center, 2 miles away.
In addition to promoting outdoor sculpture, Yellow Bird offers a retreat for writers, musicians, and creative people generally, with various trails and places for walking and meditation. Yellow Bird is also a wildlife refuge, home to deer, turkey, rabbits, turtles, frogs, salamanders, groundhogs, and birds of all sorts, not to mention a herd of goats, two and a half dogs (who look after them), and barn cats who keep down (eat) the mice.
Community participation in this project is greatly encouraged. We have an informal program of internships, residencies, workshops and class visits. Practical and financial support for these activities is always welcome. Yellow Bird Arts is a nonprofit organization accepting charitable contributions. Much of the maintenance work on the property draws on the assistance of wwoofers. Various forms of accommodation are available, including Airbnb rentals.
Plans are afoot to establish some sort of community here. Wwoofers coming and going have offered a taste of that kind of life, but only on a temporary basis. The organic garden would feed quite a few people, but it also needs lots of care and input, and it could be expanded. The most promising idea at the moment is some sort of residential meditation retreat, within a broader commitment to the healing arts, as well as artistic activity of all sorts. I have visited Green Gulch Farm Zen Center (San Francisco) for ideas, and the Kagyu Samye Ling Tibetan Buddhist Centre in Dumfries, Scotland.
Other communities nearby? Not far from Yellow Bird, there are a number of intentional communities committed to alternative lifestyles, such as Short Mountain Sanctuary a two hundred-acre faerie space in Liberty, and IDA (Idyll Dandy Arts), a queer land project and educational space. South of Nashville, near Summertown, is The Farm – a long-standing community, “based on principles of nonviolence and respect”.
To contact the director, David Wood, see the Contact Form below:
