Calendar of Events

The Arts & Culture Alliance is pleased to present a new exhibition featuring oils, acrylics, pastels, photography, fiber, and more by the visual artists of the Emporium Center. The exhibition will be on display February 11-25, 2011 in the main gallery at the Emporium Center at 100 S. Gay Street in downtown Knoxville. Gallery hours are Monday-Friday, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM.

The artists featured in the exhibition include:
Mike C. Berry – Oil, pastel – www.mikecberry.com
Bobbie Crews – Mixed media – www.bobbiecrews.com
Judi Gaston – Fiber, hand-woven garments
Bob Leggett – Watercolor, pastel
Pam Radford – Oil, watercolor
Alex Smith – Oil landscapes and portraiture – www.alexsmithstudios.com
Ray Snyder – Weaving
Kurt Weiss – Photography – www.weissphotography.com
Sandy White – Oil, watercolor

For more information on the exhibition, please call (865) 523-7543 or visit www.theemporiumcenter.com

For almost five decades, Jim Gray has painted in the shadow of the Great Smoky Mountains, creating a body of work that captures, according to the artist, "the ever changing pattern of light and shadow [that moves] across the ancient faces of the Smokies." The retrospective exhibition, Roads I've Traveled, showcases these East Tennessee-inspired landscapes, as well as additional selections from Gray's life's work, including wildlife, floral, and marine paintings and assorted sculptures in bronze.

East Tennessee Historical Society, 601 S. Gay Street, Knoxville, TN 37902. Museum hours: Monday-Friday: 9AM-4PM; Saturday: 10AM-4PM; Sunday: 1-5PM. For information: 865-215-8824, www.easttnhistory.org

Saturday February 5, 2011 at 6pm, The Beck Cultural Exchange Center will be hosting the Opening Ceremony of the annual Beck Cultural Exchange Center Black History Month Exhibit entitled, WE SHALL NOT BE MOVED!; an extensive collection of historical artifacts from the actual Civil Rights Era touring from the Tennessee State Museum in Nashville, Tennessee. This brilliant and yet delicate display is celebrating the 51st Anniversary of the Tennessee Civil Rights Sit-In Movement and is scheduled to tour across the United States beginning right here in Knoxville, Tennessee! The WE SHALL NOT BE MOVED Exhibit contains tables, bar stools, signs, pamphlets, booklets, magazines, postcards, photos, and a host of other original treasures that have been preserved from the actual Sit-In Movement during the 1960’s and beyond! This one of a kind exhibit that also features postcards of Dr. Martin Luther King at our very own Highlander Center in New Market Tennessee, will inspire you and move you to a deeper understanding of the African American heritage and their determination to Overcome, as well as the many other cultures that aided in that “Dream” coming into fruition!

The Opening Night Ceremony of the WE SHALL NOT BE MOVED Exhibit will feature our area’s most talented speakers, presenters, musicians, actors, and dancers, including The legendary Robert J. Booker, Dr. Harold Middlebrook, Avon Rollins, Sr., Will Boyd & Kelle Jolly, Knoxville Opera’s Michael Rogers, Vocalist Horace Smith, Orator Janice Nzie, Poet Andre Canty, Dancers Mikael Merchant & Daniel Lineberger, Singer/Producer Lar’Juanette Williams & Optasia Productions cast of We Shall Overcome!, and the outstanding Blues Hall of Fame East Tennessee native, Wallace Coleman with His Band from Cleveland Ohio! WE SHALL NOT BE MOVED Exhibit will be on display at The Beck Cultural Exchange Center, Inc. during the entire month of February. Come relive history through the walls of the Beck Cultural Exchange Center with tours of the facility, exhibits, and music all month long. We invite you to enrich your life by learning more about the birth of the Civil Rights Movement and Sit-in Demonstrations here the state of Tennessee. WE SHALL NOT BE MOVED is sponsored by AT&T, Premiere Building & Maintenance, The Arts and Cultural Alliance of Greater Knoxville, and The Tennessee Arts Commission. WE SHALL NOT BE MOVED opens February 5, 2011 at The Beck Cultural Exchange Center, 1927 Dandridge Avenue, 6pm and will run the entire month of February! Don’t Miss It!

1927 Dandridge Avenue, Knoxville. TN 37915. Phone: (865) 524-8461; www.beckcenter.net

We are proud to have new paintings by Kimberly Woods-Pelton. Her nostalgic and colorful work will be on display and available for purchase all month.

URBhana, 115 S. Gay Street, Knoxville, TN 37902. For information: 865-951-5454, www.urbhana.com

The Unarmed Merchants is proud to announce that we will be featuring the photography of Charles Graves for the month of February. The show titled "People, Places and Things" will include around 20 hand selected works from Charles last 30 years. Opening reception is on Friday February 4.

Unarmed Merchants, 129 S. Gay Street, Knoxville, TN 37902. Hours: Tuesday-Saturday 12-7PM. Information: 865-549-5769, www.unarmedmerchants.com

Ceramic artist Walter McConnell will visit the University of Tennessee to construct a sculpture in the UT Downtown Gallery the first week of February. McConnell, who is well recognized for his large-scale, unfired ceramic sculptures will work with UT art students to construct this project. McConnell’s installations address the relationship between nature and culture – more specifically, the means through which contemporary culture constructs an understanding of nature. McConnell currently serves on the faculty at the New York State College of Ceramics, Alfred, NY.

UT Downtown Gallery, 106 S. Gay St, Knoxville, TN 37902. Hours: Wednesday-Friday: 11AM - 6PM; Saturday: 10AM - 3PM. For information: 865-673-0802, http://web.utk.edu/~downtown

In her first solo exhibition, “Threads and Fibers,” Gibson embraces fiber arts through textiles and printmaking. Gibson’s love of the outdoors and hiking has influenced all aspects of her art, and her exhibition addresses the impact that people have had on the land through the juxtaposition of manmade to natural motifs. Her work similarly explores the permeable border between humans, other animals, and plants. Marie Gibson was born and raised in East Tennessee, and she attended Ringling College of Art in Sarasota, FL, and the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. She has attended multiple workshops at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts and Shakerag in Sewanee, TN. While at Arrowmont, Gibson discovered her love of fiber arts, and her artistic career took a turning point. Though she had loved textiles since elementary school, the instructors at Arrowmont introduced her to numerous and innovative dyeing and printmaking techniques. “I was freed from old, dated perceptions of quilting and doll making as well as printmaking,” says Gibson. Her art now sidesteps the false boundary separating craft from the fine arts.

“Threads and Fibers” will be displayed in the Balcony at the Emporium Center, 100 S. Gay Street. An opening reception will take place as part of First Friday activities on February 4 from 5:00-9:00 PM with hors d’oeuvres and wine. Gallery hours are Monday-Friday 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM with additional hours on Saturday, February 9, from 11:00 AM – 3:00 PM. For more information: (865) 523-7543, www.knoxalliance.com.

In this solo exhibition, Rice displays photographs of villages scattered throughout the countryside of Guizhou and Guangxi provenances in China, giving viewers an opportunity to visually experience the beauty of a people and place rarely seen by the west. Rice has traveled to Asia three times in the past year-and-a-half, visiting southern China twice, as well as Indonesia and Thailand. The remote mountains of southern China are home to the Miao and Dong people, two of China’s 55 officially recognized minority groups. The Miao and Dong have successfully maintained their rich language, culture and customs with little influence from the outside world. Their agrarian way of life, unique architecture, hand-crafted jewelry, and richly colored fabrics serve as a vivid reminder that, despite the rise of technology and the global economy, the world continues to be home to a diverse and often remarkably beautiful array of cultures and people. Seven thousand miles from the foothills of the Smoky Mountains, the mountains of southern China offer a unique glimpse into the lives of an isolated group of people group that, not unlike the Appalachian culture of 100 years ago, is defined by a rustic lifestyle and a rich heritage of music, arts and craft. Knoxville native Dean Rice has enjoyed photography for the past 25 years. Rice serves as the chief of staff to Knox County Mayor Tim Burchett and is an adjunct member of the faculty in the University of Tennessee’s College of Communication and Information.

“Another Way of Life: Photographs by Dean Rice” will be displayed in the Balcony at the Emporium Center, 100 S. Gay Street, from February 4-25, 2011. An opening reception will take place as part of First Friday activities on February 4 from 5:00-9:00 PM with complimentary hors d’oeuvres and wine. Gallery hours are Monday-Friday 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM with additional hours on Saturday, February 5, 10:00 AM – 5:00 PM and Sunday, February 6, 12:00-5:00 PM as part of the Foothills Craft Guild’s Fine Craft in February show. For more information, please contact the Arts & Culture Alliance at (865) 523-7543 or visit www.knoxalliance.com.

Fort Craig Elementary School

Knoxville Museum of Art, 1050 World's Fair Park Dr, Knoxville, TN 37916. Hours: Tuesday-Saturday, 10AM-5PM; Friday, 10AM-8PM; Sunday, 1-5PM. For information: 865-934-2036, www.knoxart.org

Photography by Paul Hassell

Red Line Gallery, 11519 Kingston Pike, Knoxville, TN 37934. Hours: Tuesday-Saturday 11AM-6PM. For information: 865-288-0277, www.redlinegallery.net

Art Market Gallery of Knoxville is pleased to present two special exhibits: jewelry by featured member artist Kristine Taylor and Reelin’ in Red, a special showing of Valentine and love themed artworks in various mediums by member artists. Ms. Taylor creates unique one-of-a-kind and limited edition pieces of jewelry using a blend of polymer clay and traditional jewelry materials including stones, pearls, glass, metals and fibers. A First Friday Reception for these exhibits is planned for February 4th from 5:30-9 pm with complimentary refreshments and live music performed by Stacy Nickell Miller and Clark Miller.

Art Market Gallery, 422 S. Gay St, Knoxville, TN 37902. Hours: Tuesday-Saturday 11AM-6PM; Sunday 1-5PM. For information: 865-525-5265, www.artmarketgallery.net

Oak Ridge Art Center, 201 Badger Avenue, Oak Ridge, TN 37830. Hours: Tuesday-Friday, 9AM-5PM; Saturday-Monday, 1-4PM. For information: 865-482-1441, www.oakridgeartcenter.org