Calendar of Events

Pellissippi State Community College is celebrating Black History Month with numerous events at its five campuses throughout February. Activities are free and the community is invited.

The Magnolia Avenue Campus starts the month-long activities with “Healthy Pelli: Campus Health Fair,” Wednesday, Feb. 5. Each Friday in February, the site hosts an African Jazz Cafe in the Lobby.

The Division Street Campus offers two films in February: Disney’s “Ruby Bridges” on the 11th and “Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom” on the 20th. Both are at 12:15 p.m. in the Student Lounge.

The Magnolia Avenue Campus hosts a “History of African-American Music: Freedom Songs, Blues and Jazz” 9-11 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 12, in the Community Room. The presentation features local jazz artist Kelle Jolly.

The Blount County Campus presents the documentary “The Underground Railroad” Tuesday, Feb. 18, in the Educational Resources Center.

At the Hardin Valley Campus, Feb. 21 brings “A Celebration of African-American Art, Music and Literature.” The event is in the Goins Building College Center, 11 a.m.-2 p.m. It features an art display, performance by the Vine Middle School African Dancers and Drummers, poetry reading by Oak Ridge poet Rose Weaver, and “Taste of Soul Food.”

Also at the Hardin Valley site, Feb. 27 the community is invited to a Faculty Lecture Series presentation: “John Brown: Maniacal Egotist or Moral Crusader?” by Joy Ingram, an associate professor. The talk is at 2 p.m. in the Goins Building Auditorium.

Throughout the month, African-American history exhibits will be on display in the Community Room of the Magnolia Avenue Campus, the Lobby of the Strawberry Plains Campus, the Student Lounge of the Division Street Campus, and the Educational Resources centers of the Blount County and Hardin Valley campuses.

The theme of the display at the Magnolia Avenue Campus is “All About That Jazz”; Division Street, “Embrace African-American Heritage Board of Fame”; and Strawberry Plains, “African-Americans of Influence.”

Other ongoing events include African tea and coffee tastings:
· Hardin Valley, Goins Building Rotunda, 8:30-10 a.m. Wednesdays
· Division Street, Student Lounge, 9-10:30 a.m. Wednesdays
· Strawberry Plains, Lobby, 9-10:30 a.m. Mondays

For more information about Pellissippi State, visit www.pstcc.edu or call (865) 694-6400. To request accommodations for a disability, contact the executive director of Human Resources at (865) 694-6607 or humanresources@pstcc.edu.

The first Wednesday of each month at the Square Room on Market Square. Featuring a variety of music played by local and regional musicians in various small jazz ensemble configurations. Admission is $15 and includes a lunch buffet.

TRIBUTE TO LESTER YOUNG AND BILLIE HOLIDAY
Tenor Saxophonist Lester Young and vocalist Billie Holiday were two of the most influential musicians to emerge in the 1930s. Their many collaborations produced some of the most emotionally powerful music of the 20th century. Join Will Boyd and Kelle Jolly as they recreate some of the duo’s timeless masterpieces. Selections to be performed include “He’s Funny That Way,” “Lover Man,” “Don’t Explain” and many others.

Knoxville Jazz Orchestra: 865-573-3226, www.knoxjazz.org

In a media career spanning 58 years, Hal Ernest has done it all, including an early job at NBC in New York and stints as both television news anchor and children’s program host. Now in his 47th year as account executive for Knoxville advertising agency Lavidge and Associates, Ernest is busier than ever. Join Hal as he shares behind-the-scenes stories of his career on local television and discusses the relationship between television and advertising. The Brown Bag will also include a screening of classic 1950s-era television commercials produced by Lavidge and Associates, including the classic Lays Three Little Pigs Commercials.

The lecture is held in conjunction with the exhibition, Live! On Air! and In Your Living Room, on display through February 23, 2014. The exhibit is rich with vintage clips from the old Cas Walker Farm and Home Hour, Bonnie Lou and Buster, Jim Clayton’s Startime, early television commercials, and much, much more. A 1960s living room and a backdrop of from the Cas Walker Show bring the era to life. The exhibit is presented by the East Tennessee Historical Society and the Tennessee Archive of Moving Image and Sound, a division of the Calvin M. McClung Historical Collection.

The program is sponsored by 21st Mortgage and is and free and open to the public. The lecture will begin at noon at the East Tennessee History Center, 601 S. Gay Street, Knoxville. Guests are invited to bring a “Brown Bag” lunch and enjoy the lecture. Soft drinks will be available. For more information on the lecture, exhibitions, or museum hours, call 865-215-8824 or visit the website at www.EastTNHistory.org.

With Contemporary Focus artist Jessica Wohl
Free to attend; lunches available for purchase

Knoxville Museum of Art, 1050 World's Fair Park Dr, Knoxville, TN 37916. Hours: Tuesday-Saturday, 10AM-5PM; Sunday, 1-5PM. Information: 865-525-6101, www.knoxart.org

The Farragut Arts Council will sponsor the 2014 Farragut High School Art Show this February at the Farragut Town Hall. Awards will be given for best in show and first, second and third places during a reception to honor the artists and their work on Tuesday, Feb. 4.

View during regular Town Hall hours: Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Reception: Tuesday, Feb. 4 - 5:30 to 6:30 p.m.
Where: Farragut Town Hall, 11408 Municipal Center Drive (across from the Farragut Branch Post Office)
How: The art show and reception are free and open to the public. For more information, please contact Lauren Cox, special events and program coordinator, at lauren.cox@townoffarragut.org or 966-7057.

The WordPlayers, in collaboration with The Carpetbag Theatre, will tour: A Woman Called Truth by Sandra Fenichel Asher – A one-act play with music celebrating the life and achievements of Sojourner Truth. Directed by Linda Parris-Bailey with musical direction by Kelly Jolly. The play begins at the 1851 women’s rights convention in Akron, Ohio. We then go back in time to 1797 and travel with Sojourner as she remembers some of the extraordinary experiences that shaped her life. We get a glimpse of her highly cruel and unjust treatment as a slave. We experience how she bravely took her freedom and how she fought to free her son. At the end of the play, we learn how she became “Sojourner Truth” and get a taste of her dynamic spirit as an orator as she delivers her famous “Ain’t I a Woman” speech.

A Woman Called Truth is an important story about a significant woman in our country’s history. You are invited to these free, public performances!

Feb. 2, Fourth United Presbyterian, 1323 N. Broadway, 5:00 pm
Feb. 3, Moses Teen Center, 220 Carrick St., 7:00 pm
Feb. 8, ReCreate Café, Salvation Army, Chattanooga, 1:00 pm
Feb. 11, Walters State – Sevierville, 6:00 pm
Feb. 24, Walters State – Greeneville, 11:30 am
Feb. 24, Walters State – Claiborne, 6:00 pm
Feb. 25, Roane State – Harriman, 12:30 & 6:00 pm
Feb. 28, Walters State – Morristown, 2:00 pm

Info: 865-539-2490, wordplayers@comcast.net, http://wordplayers.org/current-season/touring-shows/woman-called-truth-spring-2014

Work by 12 African-American artists
curated by Sammie Nicely

In the Edith Davis Gallery

Rose Center, 442 W Second N Street, Morristown, TN 37814
Info: info@rosecenter.org, 423-581-4330, www.rosecenter.org, www.facebook/rosecenter

February 1, 12:00 PM - IJAMS BIRDING SERIES: Sandhill Cranes at Hiwassee
(Ages 12 and up) Weather permitting, join Ijams Senior Naturalist Stephen Lyn Bales for a road trip to Hiwassee Wildlife Refuge to see sandhill cranes wintering at the Meigs County location. Golden and bald eagles, winter ducks, and whooping cranes are also possible. Meet at the Ijams Visitor Center. The fee for this program is $12 for members and $15 for non-members. Ijams will provide box lunches and hot cocoa. Please call (865) 577-4717, ext. 110 to register.

2:00 pm - IJAMS FAMILY WILDLIFE SERIES: Groundhog Day
Unlike the popular movie, you won't be forced to relive this day over and over, but you may want to! Come join us for a fun and informative talk about one of our favorite underground dwellers. Will he see his shadow? Free to members, $5 for non-members. Please call (865) 577-4717, ext. 110 to register.

Terrarium Workshop February 8
Full Moon Happy Hour Hike February 15
New Naturalist Workshop February 21
Build a Bluebird House February 22

Ijams Nature Center, 2915 Island Home Ave, Knoxville, TN 37920. Hours: Grounds and trails open during daylight hours. Call for Visitor Center hours. Information: 865-577-4717, www.ijams.org

The Knoxville Museum of Art presents Sight and Feeling: Photographs by Ansel Adams January 31-May 4, 2014. This exhibition of 23 prints by Ansel Adams emphasizes the role of the artist’s intuitive and emotional response to the landscape in the creation of his powerful and enduring images. Also included in the KMA’s special presentation of this exhibition are three rare prints Adams made during his little-known visit to East Tennessee’s Smoky Mountains in 1948. Adams is widely considered to be America’s greatest landscape photographer. His ability to create black and white photographs with a remarkable range and subtlety of tones is legendary. Yet for all Adams’ technical mastery, he recognized that what made a compelling photograph was far more elusive.

Few are aware that in 1948 Adams traveled to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park—his first and only recorded visit to Tennessee—in order take photographs as part of a Guggenheim Fellowship on America’s national parks and monuments. The resulting images represent an extensive and important artistic record of the Smokies approximately 14 years after the park was established.

There will be an opening reception Thursday, January 30 at the KMA, which includes a members-only preview from 5 to 6pm, and a public opening from 6 to 8pm.

Knoxville Museum of Art, 1050 World's Fair Park Dr, Knoxville, TN 37916. Hours: Tuesday-Saturday, 10AM-5PM; Sunday, 1-5PM. Information: 865-525-6101, www.knoxart.org

The Knoxville Museum of Art presents Contemporary Focus January 31-April 6. This annual exhibition series is designed to serve as a vital means of recognizing, supporting, and documenting the development of contemporary art in East Tennessee. Each year, the exhibition series features the work of artists who are living and making art in this region, and who are exploring issues relevant to the larger world of contemporary art. The three artists selected for this year’s exhibition have a common interest in creating layered works dealing with memory, identity and the surrounding environment—whether suburban, rural, synthetic, or natural. Jean Hess produces dense, intricate collages made up of fragments culled from eclectic sources such as topographical charts, children’s writings, and the natural landscape. In addition to her studio practice, Hess is active as a freelance art writer and curator. Althea Murphy-Price is a printmaker and installation artist who uses hair—both human and artificial—rather than a drawn line as the basis for her elaborately textured compositions. Murphy-Price is an assistant professor of printmaking at the School of Art, University of Tennessee. Jessica Wohl is a mixed media artist based in Sewanee whose sprawling installations, obsessively detailed ink drawings, and sewn portraits are largely inspired by contemporary suburban life. She currently lives in Sewanee, Tennessee where she is an Assistant Professor of Art at The University of the South.

There will be an opening reception Thursday, January 30 at the KMA, which includes a members-only preview from 5 to 6pm, and a public opening from 6 to 8pm.

Knoxville Museum of Art, 1050 World's Fair Park Dr, Knoxville, TN 37916. Hours: Tuesday-Saturday, 10AM-5PM; Sunday, 1-5PM. Information: 865-525-6101, www.knoxart.org

By Matthew Lopes; Directed by John Sipes

Everyone has scars in this stirring period drama. In April 1865, a wounded Jewish Confederate soldier returns to his home in Richmond only to find it ruined and abandoned--except for two former slaves also raised in the Jewish faith. As the three men celebrate Passover, they uncover a tangle of secrets and grapple with an uncertain future brought on by the end of the Civil War.

This production contains strong language and content and is recommended for high school and up.

Clarence Brown Theatre / Carousel Theatre, 1714 Andy Holt Ave on the UT campus, Knoxville, TN 37996. For information: 865-974-5161, www.clarencebrowntheatre.com. For tickets: 865-974-5161, 865-656-4444, www.knoxvilletickets.com

In Kaufman and Hart’s 1940s comedy, famed author and personality Sheridan Whiteside, invited to dinner during a speaking tour, slips on the doorstep, breaking his hip. A tumultuous six weeks of confinement follows as the irascible and disagreeable invalid takes over the host family’s home and destroys their domestic tranquility with the arrival of strange and exotic get-well gifts, a parade of celebrity friends, and a devious plot to undermine his secretary’s budding romance.

Oak Ridge Playhouse, 227 Broadway, Oak Ridge, TN 37830. Information and tickets: 865-482-9999, www.orplayhouse.com