January 2026 is here and with it, a visit to Cica Ghost’s Mysterious Isle to visit her latest installation there, Woodland. The setting comes with a quote oft attributed to the Master of the Imagination, Walt Disney:
If you can dream it, you can do it.
The reality of the world is that there is no evidence Disney ever uttered these words. Rather, the first public attribution of the quote to anything related to Disney appears to have come in 1983, seventeen years after his passing. They appeared in a script used in Horizons (1983-1994), an animatronic attraction at the EPCOT Centre (as it was then) at Walt Disney World, Florida.
Exactly who coined the phrase – script writer Tom Fitzgerald or copywriter Sheralyn Silverstein – remains a topic of debate; it only became associated with Disney himself much later – in 2007, when it was used in a DVD series on the Disney phenomena and the marketing machine at Disney wasted no time in acquiring the idea the words were Walt’s – and started marketing them at every turn.
However, all this be as it may, the idea the words convey is totally applicable to Cica’s work. Month after month she presents us with installations grown from her dreams and made into living experiences for us to enjoy. Some of her works have carried subtle messages; some have offered new takes on various folk tales and fables; many have been twists of whimsy and lightness, speaking to Cica’s spirit of positivity; some have been perhaps pensive and forward-looking. All have have had deep roots in the dreams of a creative imagination – and such is the case here.
The term “woodland” probably conjures images of trees heavy in leaf, grassy trials meandering between their trucks, sprinkled with bursts of flowers, light and shadow rippling and playing over them as a breeze moves the boughs overhead. A place where creatures, possibly stranger or exotic, and insects reside, all going about their business.
The flowers and the creatures and insects are all within Cica’s Woodland, and many of them are exotic – a chameleon-like lizard, stick insects and more. However, in a twist of imagination they all appear to be carved or grown from wood, and the majority of “trees” of this woodland are all houses and buildings, many of them rising slender and tall, like tree trunks with the unblinking eyes of windows cut into them, others offering a unique take on the windmill. All stand four-square on stout legs as if ready to set out across the surrounding hills.
All of this – creatures, houses, flowers, trees, is being watched over by a satisfied King (or Prince?) Frog. Is he responsible for this wonderland? If so, why? That’s a dream for your imagination to create, perhaps as you try the dances scattered across the setting and wander among the land’s friendly inhabitants.
SLurl Details
- Woodland (Mysterious Isle, rated Moderate)
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 