If you live in the east end of Guelph you’ve likely seen cartoon character cut-outs outside of a home on Grange Road these last couple years.
The characters won't be seen for much longer since the house recently sold.
The artist behind the cut-outs is Dorothy Amey. She and her husband lived in their Grange Road home for 34 years. They lived at two other homes in the area for 14 years prior.
They moved to an apartment in Rockwood a month ago and are handing over the keys to their family home on Monday.
Amey began making the characters to hang on her fence during the pandemic for passersby to see. She’s made Ken and Barbie, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles characters, Shrek, Spider-Man and many more.
People used to drop-off notes and gifts as a thank you since her art brought smiles to people’s faces.
The move is bittersweet but Amey is happy her home can be a new home for a young family.
In a bedroom Amey painted a mural of the Flintstones featuring Fred, Wilma, Pebbles and other characters from the TV show. She doesn’t want to say the mural was the deciding factor of the people who bought the home but they did like it.
She’s left murals on the walls of her previous homes too.
Amey gave away many of her art pieces but kept one she calls Howie and it’s displayed in the studio of her new apartment. Howie is an elderly man who holds an umbrella with cats and dogs hanging from it.
“It's just a beautiful space,” she said. The studio fits a leather couch, her grandson’s favourite coffee table, Mickey Mouse suitcases and a desk where she makes her art.
She doesn’t miss the traffic on Grange. It was the perfect home for her family especially when her grandchildren would visit. “I just feel like it’s time.” Downsizing from a big single-family home to an apartment was the best move for her and her husband.
Amey will miss seeing children walk by looking at the characters on the fence.
In the last year a couple of her pieces were stolen from her fence. One of the characters stolen was Spider-Man. “That's the first time anybody's taken my work,” said Amey. During Christmas she made nutcrackers and displayed them by the front window instead of putting them outside.
She doesn’t know if she’ll display characters on her apartment’s balcony since it doesn’t face the road. Instead she might paint some of the windows.
In Rockwood she offered to paint designs on windows of a library and Rockmosa Older Adults Centre.
“I definitely want to use my creativity to do something,” said Amey.
She gets her artistic talent from the Irish side of her family. “I'm so happy that I was given that gift because it's brought a lot of happiness, joy, smiles to other people and myself.”
The last character she put up before she left to Rockwood was Porky Pig popping out of a drum just like the end credits of Looney Tunes.
Amey’s goodbye message to the community is; “th-th-th-th-that’s all, folks! Thank you Guelph. Stay tuned Rockwood.”
