Calendar of Events

Afrofuturist, artist, educator, graphic designer, and DJ, Stacey Robinson will be having exhibitions at the UT Downtown Gallery, Ewing Gallery, and a 5-day artist residency in Knoxville, during fall of 2023. Robinson’s time in Knoxville will coincide with an intentional Afrofuturist takeover of the galleries with the presentation of his exhibition projects, Black Audacious Freedom Dreams and Black Utopia: Black Distractions & Disruptions in Time Space, to be on view in fall 2023. Infusing downtown Knoxville and the University of Tennessee campus with Afrofuturistic imagery, Robinson and the galleries will build a critical mass of Black thought and creativity to amplify and center Black voices.

The Ewing Gallery, located in UT’s Art + Architecture Building will present Black Audacious Freedom Dreams by BLACKMAU, a creative collaboration between Stacey “ Blackstar” Robinson and Kamau “DJ Kamaumau” Grantham. This exhibition features a multimedia projection and seven 7-foot banners created using digital collage. These images visually mimic the audio sampling used throughout hip hop musical production and the process of crafting a tight DJ set, which inspire the duo. This work prompts a conversation about Black liberation as a reality not yet fulfilled. By centering Black people within the narrative, BLACKMAU prompts the audience to imagine themselves in the spaces with the subject. Robinson and Grantham reference Black liberation texts with With Black Audacious Freedom Dreams, including Freedom Dreams by Robin D.G. Kelly, and We Want to Do More Than Survive by Bettina L. Love, which they include in a study area and curated library of Black texts in the exhibition.

Concurrent with Black Audacious Freedom Dreams, the UT Downtown Gallery will present Robinson’s new solo project, Black Utopia; Black Distractions & Disruptions in Time Space. This exhibition is a design research project looking at systems of oppression and resistance through black and white logo designs and illustrations that use the emptiness of white gallery walls as the backdrop for extracting Black resistance commentary. The systems examined springboard a burgeoning theory comprised of Black-created systems that can function as a form of Black liberation government in lieu of Black Reparations, justice, and failed integration.

Date: Wednesday October 4, 2023
Location: McCarty Auditorium, 1715 Volunteer Boulevard
Time: 5:30PM
For more information: ewing@utk.edu
Presented by the UT Downtown Gallery, The Ewing Gallery, and the UT School of Art

865.974.3200
www.ewing-gallery.utk.edu

Wednesday, October 4, 5:30pm
McCarty Auditorium, Art + Architecture Building, UT Campus

Stacey A. Robinson, Associate Professor of Graphic Design at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was a 2019-2020 Nasir Jones Hip-Hop Fellow at Harvard University’s Hutchins Center for African & African American Research and completed his MFA at the University at Buffalo in 2015.

His work discusses decolonized Black futures. Illustrated books include: I Am Alfonso Jones written by Tony Medina (2017) Lee & Low Books, and Across the Tracks: Remembering Greenwood, Black Wall Street, and the Tulsa Race Massacre, written Alverne Ball (2021) Abrams Books. Exhibitions include: Ascension of Black Stillness (CEPA Gallery) and The Black Angel of History (Carnegie Hall) 2022.

https://art.utk.edu/

Cherokee basketry and Southern Appalachian basket styles are on display now at Pellissippi State Community College’s Strawberry Plains Campus. The “All the Eggs in One Basket” exhibit curated by Art Professor Jeffrey Lockett is free and open to the public through the college’s Appalachian Heritage Project, which is housed in the Strawberry Plains Campus Library. Funded in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Appalachian Heritage Project serves as a repository for regional literature, history and folklore and includes programming including exhibits, lectures and workshops. “Abundant river cane in the Southern Appalachians contributes to its widespread use in weaving and basketry,” Lockett said. “The known works of the 17th century Cherokee Indians introduced the unique combination of materials and weave patterns using this cane.”

In the 18th and 19th centuries, storage baskets were used for daily needs such as harvesting, transportation and food preparation, Lockett added. However, as mountain tourism and markets for mountain crafts grew into the 20th century, Cherokee basket makers responded by producing baskets for the tourist trade. Most baskets on display in the "All the Eggs in One Basket” exhibit were made by Jimmy Lawrence of Clinton, Tennessee. Lawrence, born in 1937 in Abington, Virginia, is a Virginia Tech-educated mechanical engineer with a lifelong fascination with Appalachian crafts. He and his wife, Gail, have a regionally known collection of Southern folk art, crafts and utilitarian ware at their home.

“Jimmy says his curiosity for Southern crafts together with his engineering background has allowed him to approach basketmaking and weaving as an artform as well as an achievement in engineering,” said Lockett, who named the exhibit in honor of the variety of Lawrence’s traditional egg baskets that are on display. "Jimmy takes traditional Appalachian styles as well as Cherokee weaving traditions and varies the materials to include slippery elm bark, native cane and white oak.” All works in the exhibit are from the collections of Lawrence or Lockett. The Strawberry Plains Campus Library is open 8 a.m.-7:30 p.m. Monday-Thursday and 8 a.m.-4 p.m. Friday.

Pellissippi State | 865.694.6638 | marketing@pstcc.edu | www.pstcc.edu

The Tennessee Artist’s Association is holding its Annual Members Juried Art Show at the Fountain City Art Center, 213 Hotel Rd., Knoxville, 37918. A gala reception will be held on Sunday, October 1, 2:00 - 4:00 pm, and refreshments will be available. Fountain City Art Center regular hours are Tuesday- Thursday, 10:00 am to 4:00 pm.

More than 40 artists and over 100 pieces of artwork will be represented at the show. Prizes include Best of Show, 1st Place, 2nd Place, & 3rd Place in various categories, including Portraiture, Figurative & Animals; Abstract, including 3-D & Collage; Landscapes, including Seascapes & Streetscapes; Flowers & Still Life; and Emerging Artists will be featured.

Juror is Michael C. Berry, a working artist and professor of art at UT. Berry is known for his dynamic urban compositions that bend and twist the cityscapes that have become his unique style. Berry was the 2007 Dogwood Arts Festival Limited Edition Print Artist and has earned various awards and recognitions over the years.

TAA is celebrating 51 years as the area’s oldest member supported arts organization. TAA members work in many different genres of art and types of media and at various levels of ability. TAA seeks to be inclusive of all members and encourages active participation in shows and events.

Tennessee Artists Association meets monthly at Westminster Presbyterian Church, 6500 Northshore Dr., Knoxville. TAA - A place to learn and grow as an artist. Monthly programs of TAA include practical art demonstrations, discussions, and opportunities for individual artists to get involved in learning, community and shows More on the Tennessee Artist’s Association can be found on the web at https://tnartists.org, on Instagram at @tn_artists, and on Facebook at TNArtistsAssociation.

New Work by Beth Meadows and Mike Berry
at The Maker Exchange, 710 Clinch Avenue, Knoxville, TN
Opening Reception Thursday, October 5, 5-8 pm
Show runs September 30- December 10, 2023

The Richness of Life is a joint exhibition of new paintings and cutouts.

Gallery is open 24/7, however...
• Sometimes the Maker Exchange holds events in the gallery space. Call ahead to check for any events that would affect normal hours (865) 522-2800 ext. 7
• On the night of the opening, artists I will have smaller items for sale

https://bethmeadows.com/
http://www.mikecberry.com/
https://www.makerexchangeknox.com/

Open Show 2023 is the annual juried exhibition for all artists in all media

Opening reception Sat Sep 30, 7-9 PM with gallery talk at 6:30 PM and awards at 7 PM

Oak Ridge Art Center, 201 Badger Avenue, Oak Ridge, TN 37830. Hours: Tu-F 9-5, Sa-M 1-4. Information: 865-482-1441, www.oakridgeartcenter.org

September 29 – November 1, 2023 : Tennessee Artist Association Annual Juried Show

Fountain City Art Center, 213 Hotel Ave, Knoxville, TN 37918. Hours: Tue-Thu 10 AM - 4 PM. Information: 865-357-2787, www.fountaincityartcenter.com

The Bagwell Gallery will be hosting a solo exhibition of Prints and Collages by Aaron Coleman from September 25th through October 20th, 2023. The exhibition showcases Coleman’s virtuosic work in lithography as well as a small sampling of his collages, which are by turns hilarious, vivid and thought provoking. In addition to being arresting images the work also is technically masterful and shows his incredible depth of skill.

Aaron is a multi-disciplinary artist, Associate Professor and Kenneth E. Tyler Endowed Chair at the Herron School of Art and Design in Indianapolis. He received his MFA from Northern Illinois University in 2013. Aaron has participated in international residencies and exhibitions and has received numerous awards for his work in printmaking, sculpture and installation including 2021 Black Box Press Foundation’s Art as Activism Grant. He is a 2022 Joan Mitchell Foundation Fellowship semi-finalist and the recipient of the 2023 New Voices Fellowship from the International Print Center New York. His work can be found in the collections of The Janet Turner Print Museum, the Ino-cho Paper Museum in Kochi, Japan, The National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, The Yekaterinburg Museum of Art in Yekaterinburg, Russia, the National Library of France, and the Artist Printmaker and Photographer Research Archive in the Museum of Texas Tech University among many other public and private collections.

Aaron was a co-founder of the Sienna Collective for Students of Color in the Arts at the University of Arizona and in 2021 received the Provost Award for Innovations in Teaching as well as the College of Fine Arts Undergraduate Mentorship Award. Aaron’s hobbies change from year to year but currently include the cultivation of rare, terrestrial, African orchids. He is a husband, dog lover and workaholic.

Hardin Valley Campus of Pellissippi State: 10915 Hardin Valley Road, Knoxville, TN 37932. Bagwell Center Gallery hours: M-F 9-5. Information: 865-694-6405, www.pstcc.edu/arts

Featuring varied works by current faculty: Heather Hartman Folks, Matthew Jessie, Julie L. Rabun, Jennifer Stoneking-Stewart, and David Underwood.

Opens Thu Sep 7, 3-5 PM and closes Sat Oct 28, 9:30 AM - 12

The Michael Alvis Art Gallery at Carson-Newman University, Warren Art Building, corner of Branner & Ken Sparks Way, Jefferson City, TN 37760. Gallery hours: M-F 8-4. Information: 865-471-4985, www.cn.edu

Local-scape is an exhibition of works illustrating the beautiful and poetic places in and around East Tennessee. These places have inspired Berry to use his own personal language of color and composition to create unique works that are created from everyday scenes to become a work of the local-scape. These works fix one's memory onto one particular moment that in turn inspires a thousand interpretations of place or experience through expressive color application. Mike Berry received his M.F.A. from the Savannah College of Art & Design in 1997, and has been managing the University of Tennessee Downtown Gallery since 2004. Berry’s artwork has been exhibited regionally, including solo and group exhibitions throughout the southeast during the last 20 years. Berry maintains a studio in Knoxville TN and works with private collectors and corporate businesses on commissioned pieces. Berry also is the official framer for the Beauford Delaney Estate located in Knoxville. Knoxville has been the main subject of Berry’s work for more than a two decades and he has made Knoxville his home since 1999.

Linda Sullivan has a Bachelor of Arts and Math from the University of Evansville (Indiana) and a Master of Fine Arts from Northern Illinois University where she focused on glaze chemistry and glaze testing. Her functional pottery has evolved to include interpretations of landscapes through the glazing process. All her glazes are self developed and poured to overlap each other in a painterly way. She especially draws inspiration from the landscapes of the Southwest.

Works will be on view in the Schilling Gallery Monday-Thursday, 9-4; and Friday, 9-noon.
Westminster Presbyterian Church Schilling Gallery, 6500 Northshore Drive, Knoxville, TN 37919
Information: 865-584-3957.

Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, 556 Parkway, Gatlinburg, TN 37738. Information: 865-436-5860, https://www.arrowmont.org/visit/galleries/exhibition-schedule/

RECEPTION: Friday September 8th, 5-7pm
https://art.utk.edu/printmaking-faculty-present-retrospect-exhibit/

“RETRoSPECT” surveys recent and past works by UT Printmaking faculty members Beauvais Lyons, Althea Murphy-Price and Koichi Yamamoto, as well as 2D Printmaking Technician Elysia Mann. Included in the exhibition are both traditional print processes, from engravings and intaglios, to screenprints and lithographs, as well as experimental uses of print media. The UT Printmaking program is consistent ranked among the top graduate programs in the United States. It has a long-standing exchange program with the Eugeniusz Geppert Academy of Art and Design in Wrocław, Poland. The exhibition is free and open to the public, and is a project of the Marek Maria Pienkowski Foundation. For more information on the UTK Printmaking Program, see: https://art.utk.edu/printmaking/

Pienkow Art Gallery, 7417 Kingston Pike Knoxville, TN 37919
Hours: Mon-Fri 8-5 and Sat 8-11