Calendar of Events

On October 5-6 the streets of Downtown, Newport TN will be filled with people, food, crafts and entertainment as an East Tennessee tradition continues! This highly anticipated annual event promises to provide the crowd with a weekend to remember!

Come enjoy the enticing aromas of all your favorite festival foods, from fresh squeezed lemonade, corn dogs, spiral taters to funnel cakes and deep-fried desserts. As always, we have a wonderful line up for entertainment, so bring your favorite lawn chair, pick out a spot at the entertainment stage and let our performers provide some toe’ tappin tunes. And then on Sunday, traditional mountain music will fill the air.

As you stroll through the streets of downtown Newport, you will have opportunity to purchase many wares of local and regional crafters. Everything from coveted cookbooks full of recipes from some of the best cooks around, oil paintings, pencil drawings, children’s toys, face painting, décor, and many other handmade items will be on display. When you have wrapped up your shopping, let the kids stop by the Kiddie Land, located off the food court, with the purchase of an armband they will have hours of fun hopping in the bounce house, enjoying a fast ride down one of the slides or jousting with friends, and let’s not forget they can also play some ball. Armbands will be available for Saturday and Sunday for your children.

Bible Believer’s Cowboy Church will once again offer horse rides. Children and adults will be able to get a view of the festival by train; Kiwanis of Newport Train that is! When you depart your train excursion, helicopter rides for children will be available from the Kiwanis of Newport also.

We can’t forget some of the most beautiful sites you’ll see at the Newport Harvest Street Festival. It’s all the lovely ladies and babies that come to strut their stuff at the beauty pageants. Children up to 16 years of age will compete in pageants according to their age bracket. The ever-popular Miss Newport Harvest Festival, for females ages 16-21 years old, will be the last pageant of the day. All pageants will be located on the Court House lawn Saturday starting at 10:30 am.

And don’t forget ole-timey activities around the Courthouse. East Tennessee Overhill Intertribal descendants, Pastor Jimmy Morrow, Sons of Confederate Veterans and Wade Lane and more will be taking you back in time.

For more information on the 33rd Annual Newport Harvest Street Festival please contact the Chamber of Commerce office at 423-623-7201 or via email to lramsey@cockecountypartnership.com.
or visit the Newport Harvest Street Festival page on Facebook!

Enjoy the Opening Reception of the “Autumn Blaze” Fall Art Show on Friday, October 4, from 5:00 – 7:00 p.m. This special reception is scheduled on the regular monthly “Fun and Wine Friday” reception date. Participants can view the show entries and watch the presentation of awards to the winning artists. Hors d'oeuvres, wine, and other beverages will be available. The reception is free and open to the public. The “Autumn Blaze” Fall Art Show will be on display in the gallery through October 31.

Art Guild at Fairfield Glade at the Plateau Creative Arts Center, 451 Lakeview Drive, Fairfield Glade, TN 38558. Information: 931-707-7249, www.artguildfairfieldglade.net

October Featured Artists - First Friday Reception: October 4, 5:30 – 9 p.m.

Marie Merritt interprets the scenic vistas, babbling streams, lovely flora, and majestic animals she encounters in nature throughout her signature style of oil painting. She strives to impart the same sense of awe, peace and calm that she enjoys. She develops a quality of depth and dimension in her paintings that is sensitive and expressive by using traditional time honored techniques of multiple layers of oil paints and glazes. Marie, a native of East Tennessee, has received numerous awards, designations and recognitions with her art, including Certified Decorative Artist and Teacher of Decorative Arts. Her original works hang in private and corporate collections throughout the region and her art has been featured on book covers and in magazines. She is represented by the Art Market Gallery in Knoxville, TN and her work can be seen at www.mariemerritt.com

Linda Sullivan: My ceramic work for several years has consisted of wheel-thrown and hand-formed stoneware and porcelain fired to 2300 degrees F in the oxidizing atmosphere of electric kilns. I have had a special interest in developing unique glazes since graduate school at Northern Illinois University, where I received a Master of Fine Arts Degree. My work has often evoked landscape imagery. While I continue with that glaze approach, retirement a few years ago from a career in healthcare information technology allowed me time to finally begin experimenting with crystalline glazes.
The pieces in this show were made using porcelain clay with self-developed glazes containing chemicals, such as zinc oxide, that encourage development of crystals. I program a computerized kiln to reach a peak temperature of 2300 degrees and then cool slowly by holding at multiple specific temperatures for up to three hours at a time for crystal formation. Just as in nature, when conditions are right, crystals will develop and grow, resulting in unique pieces that differ from one another and cannot be duplicated. The process for creating crystalline work is challenging in that successful results require several steps to ensure that crystals form. Conditions must be correct – including appropriate clay body, fluid glazes with specific chemical ingredients and percentages, thickness of glaze, and firing/cooling kiln cycle are critical. The failure rate with this technique is greater than in my other work. However, experimenting with crystalline glazes has really captured my interest for now and has been very satisfying in spite of the unpredictability. The process for creating crystalline work is challenging in that successful results require several steps to ensure that crystals form. Conditions must be correct – including appropriate clay body, fluid glazes with specific chemical ingredients and percentages, thickness of glaze, and firing/cooling kiln cycle are critical. The failure rate with this technique is greater than in my other work. However, experimenting with crystalline glazes has really captured my interest for now and has been very satisfying in spite of the unpredictability.

Art Market Gallery, 422 S. Gay St, Knoxville, TN 37902. Hours: Tu-Sa 11-6, Su 1-6. Information: 865-525-5265, www.artmarketgallery.net

October 4th 6-9PM (Will be on display the entire month)

Join us in welcoming Pippin Long as our October First Friday artist. She is a native Tennessean and a graduate of UT Knoxville with a degree in art. While she enjoys experimenting with various mediums and techniques, Pippin’s main focus is in drawing and painting, and has worked with watercolors from a very young age. Her newest work explores portraiture and the treatment of skin using watercolor and negative space. Pippin currently makes her home in Asheville, NC.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1229898297217399/

Rala, 112 W. Jackson Ave, Knoxville, TN 37902
HOURS: Mon - Thurs: 10:00am to 8:00pm, Fri - Sat: 10:00am to 9:00pm, Sun: 11:00am to 5:00pm
PH: (865) 525-7888, Instagram: @ShopRala
https://shoprala.com

Awaken Coffee will host artist Rita Nabors for First Friday, Oct. 4 from 6-9 pm.

Rita Nabors is primarily self-taught, relying on continuous study, practice, and observation. Painting in oil and acrylic, her favorite subjects are landscapes and animals. Her current Farm Series is painted on rusty roofing tin.

Join us for inspiring art, refreshments and of course great coffee!

Awaken Coffee is a live music venue, espresso bar, craft beer & wine bar and organic restaurant in the heart of downtown. Awaken Coffee, 125 W Jackson Ave, Knoxville, Tennessee 37902

Hours: Mon-Thu 7 AM - 9 PM, Fri 7 AM - 10 PM, Sat 8 AM - 10 PM, Sun 2-8 PM

Broadway Studios and Gallery will be hosting The Community Art League of Athens, Tn with their show entitled "Trading Spaces" for the first Friday event in October.

Broadway Studios and Gallery, 1127 Broadway St, Knoxville, TN 37917. Hours: Fri-Sat, 10-6, by appointment, or when the "open" sign is illuminated. Information: 865-556-8676, www.BroadwayStudiosAndGallery.com

October 4th, 2019 | 7-10pm
and the month of October by appointment

Work by newish member Eleanor Aldrich and Barbara Weissberger who form the long-distance material collaboration ALDRICH+WEISSBERGER

ABOUT THE SHOW:
Our collaborative installations combine original objects, sculptures, paintings, and photographs that come together from our separate studios to form a new work. As we work in separate regions of the country, the meeting and melding of our work is phenomenological – a third thing resulting from shared formal sensibilities and overlapping philosophical concerns. The work comes together through Skype chats, emails, individual material investigations, and the final in-person negotiation of the works in relation to each other and in space.
We are curious about perception and reality. Together our work forms structures within which the actual (real) thing, abstraction, pictorial space and physical space freely circulate and mingle. We make (or alter) all the objects in the installations, and even the flattest parts (photograph and canvas) are called out as physical objects.

Mops, drains, buckets, rags, dustpans, brooms, vacuum cleaners and other tools of cleaning and maintenance will form the central imagery of CUSTODIA. Cleaning tools are liminal - dirty in that they are always touching things that are dirty, but necessary for cleanliness. The banal is blurred with the mystical, the chore with the compulsion to create. Dirty and abject things may appear authentic and trustworthy in that they are by definition non-seductive and contain no outer shell of artifice, which infers some interior meaning--though the clutter is arranged, and the colors to be strewn are chosen.

ABOUT ALDRICH + WEISSBERGER: Eleanor Aldrich and Barbara Weissberger met as participants in The Drawing Center’s inaugural Open Sessions program in 2014 where their work was paired based on their mutual affinities. Since meeting they have collaborated on work that has appeared in group exhibitions (Material Outreach Program at the Drawing Center, NY), solo installations at GRIN Providence (Hive And Double) and the University of Pittsburgh (Dirty Work), and now CUSTODIA at Courtside, Knoxville. They continue to be curious about the tensions between the actual and illusion, perception and reality. All of their installations have referenced mundane objects, tools of cleaning (domestic and institutional) as well as tools of the studio.

C for Courtside, 513 Cooper Street, Knoxville, TN 37917. Information: cforcourtside@gmail.com, www.cforcourtside.com

Appalachian Arts Craft Center (AACC) in Norris is celebrating 50 years of service to crafts in Appalachia! Throughout the week of October 4 - 13, the AACC will be participating in Tennessee Craft Week! Regional artisans using the weaving and pottery studio, demonstrations by quilters and more!

In conjunction with Tennessee Craft Week, the AACC will be conducting their annual Fall Porch Sale October 4 - 18. The Porch Sale features work from juried and nonjuried members of the Craft Center and is an excellent time to shop for discounted artwork. The Porch Sale provides Center members the opportunity to replenish their artwork for the new year.

Appalachian Arts Craft Center: 2716 Andersonville Highway, Clinton, TN. Hours: M-Sa 10-6, Su 1-5. Information: 865-494-9854, www.appalachianarts.net

Robert A. Tino Gallery's Fall Festival is an autumn tradition for all ages. . . and you don't want to miss it! It runs Friday, October 4 through Sunday, October 6.

This year's festival will boast local crafters and artisans displaying a variety of handmade items that represent the area's Smoky Mountain heritage. With a range of contemporary and traditional vendors, there is something for everyone. During the three-day event, guests can view lye soap-making, blacksmithing, basket weaving, woodworking, handblown glass, pottery-making and various other craft vendors. There will also be live bluegrass music, delicious Southern food, wagon rides, and a slew of activities for children such as old-fashioned kids' games, and a pick-and-paint pumpkin patch.

The festival kicks off on Friday, October 4th from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and runs through Sunday, October 6th. Saturday and Sunday festival hours are from 10 a.m.– 5 p.m. Admission to the festival is $5.00 for adults, and children 12 and under are admitted for free. Event parking is free. A portion of the proceeds from ticket sales will benefit the Robert A. Tino Art Scholarship at Sevier County High School. The event is located at the Robert A. Tino Gallery on Sunset View Farm. The address is 812 Old Douglas Dam Rd, Sevierville, Tennessee 37876.

For additional information, please visit www.robertatinosmokymountainhomecoming.com or call 865-453-6315

9 AM - 4:45 PM daily

Twelve artisans of the Townsend Artisan Guild will be exhibiting and offering for sale their art at the Townsend Visitor Center. Throughout each day, artists will be demonstrating their techniques and explaining their processes for various art forms including pine needle baskets, painting, pottery, mixed media, fiber arts, and jewelry. A portion of the sales will be donated to the art program at the Townsend Elementary School.

The event will be held at 7906 East Lamar Alexander Parkway (Hwy 321) in Townsend.

Info: www.townsendartisanguild.org

Dogwood Arts is on a mission to Keep Knoxville Blooming––one tree at a time. Through our annual Bazillion Blooms program, disease-resistant dogwood trees are on sale now at dogwoodarts.com or by phone at (865) 637-4561 through November 18th . These 2’ – 4’ bare-root trees are available for $25 each or five for $100. Tree pick-up day and community-wide tree planting date is set for Saturday, December 7th.

Planting trees is a simple and effective way to clean our air, reduce stress, and conserve the environment. We encourage everyone to ‘dig-in’ and make a lasting difference by planting trees during the fall gardening season. Trees planted in the fall have time to develop strong root systems over the winter months before the challenges of the drying summer heat.

The Bazillion Blooms program began in 2009 with a mission to revitalize tree plantings along our historic Dogwood Trails and throughout the region. Last year, Dogwood Arts reached our goal of adding 10,000 dogwood trees to East Tennessee’s landscape in just 10 years through the Bazillion Blooms program, ensuring our region’s spring beauty will continue well into the future. Larger blooming trees, flowering shrubs, bulbs, and perennials are available at these participating Garden Centers: Ellenburg Landscaping & Nursery, Mayo Garden Centers, Northshore Nursery, Stanley’s Greenhouse & Wilson Fine Gardens.

Trees ordered from Dogwood Arts must be picked up on Saturday, December 7th, from 9AM-12PM at the UT Gardens off Neyland Drive. Trees will not be distributed at a later time or date.

Dogwood Arts, 123 W. Jackson Ave, Knoxville, TN 37902. Information: 865-637-4561, www.dogwoodarts.com

The world premiere of the CBT-commissioned “People Where They Are” will be performed in the Clarence Brown Theatre’s Carousel Theatre October 2 – 20, 2019. Written specifically for the current UT Theatre MFA actors by Anthony Clarvoe and directed by Calvin MacLean, the play dramatizes the famous Highlander Center’s expansion into the Civil Rights movement, and more. Several ancillary events will accompany this production.

In 1932, Myles Horton, Don West, Jim Dombrowski and others founded the Highlander Folk School in Monteagle, Tennessee. They focused first on organizing unemployed and working people, and by the late 1930s Highlander was serving as the de-facto CIO education center for the region, training union organizers and leaders in 11 southern states. During this period, Highlander also fought segregation in the labor movement, holding its first integrated workshop in 1944. Highlander’s commitment to ending segregation made it a critically important incubator of the Civil Rights movement. Workshops and training sessions at Highlander helped lay the groundwork for many of the movement’s most important initiatives, including the Montgomery bus boycott, the Citizenship Schools, and the founding of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). In 1961, after years of red-baiting and several government investigations, the state of Tennessee revoked Highlander’s charter and seized its land and buildings. The school reopened the next day as the Highlander Research and Education Center. From 1961-1971, it was based in Knoxville, and in 1972 it moved to its current location near New Market, Tennessee.

According to Clarvoe, all the actions depicted in the play actually happened and all the characters are based on actual people. But the timeline of events has been rearranged and telescoped and the named characters are amalgams of several different historical figures.

Clarence Brown 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