Calendar of Events

Looking to practice your Spanish? We’d love for you to join us for our virtual Spanish Conversation Table each Thursday from 6-8 p.m! This weekly gathering led by expert Argentine language instructor Inés Gadea is the perfect opportunity for speakers of all levels to practice their Spanish with a native speaker in a fun, casual and comfortable fashion. Learn more and register here.
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSenIOke40xlTo9-O6wyclpT4TSn_AmFgxkc4VMzO0M0rRbaGA/viewform

PECHAKUCHA VOLUME 38
Live! Virtual! Safe!
Thursday, Feb 11 on Facebook Live
Streaming Live from the Bijou!

Please join us for the next virtual installment of our favorite event, PechaKucha Night Knoxville!
Feed Goes Live 7:45
Presentations Begin 8:00

PRESENTERS
// Eric Gray, Catalyst Sports
// Matthew Kellogg, Appalachian Mountain Bike Club
// Amos Oaks, Visual and Mixed Media Artist
// Amanda Mohney, The Pigeon Parade
// Gretchen Pardon, Appalachian Trail Thru-Hiker
// Jack Neely, Knoxville History Project
// Tyler Roy, Whitten & Roy Partnership

// In lieu of donations at the door, we encourage you to support a current or past presenter during this time, or make a donation to the Bijou Theatre which has been closed since March 13 due to the pandemic.

https://www.pechakucha.com/cities/knoxville

Spring will soon be here and our local birds will again begin their courtship season. Join us as naturalist Stephen Lyn Bales explains bird courtship rituals and habits at this Zoom educational presentation on Thursday, February 11 at 7:00 p.m. Did you know that the male bird claims their territory and attract the attention of female birds with their song quality, attentive behavior and bright plumage?

The program is sponsored by the UT Arboretum Society and the UT Forest Resources AgReseach and Education Center. You’ll learn that female cardinals look for the brightest red males to become their mates. On the date of the program, spring will be just a little over a month away so it’s a great time to learn about our birds.

Registration for this free online event is required. The format for this program will be Zoom. To register go to: utarboretumsociety.org. You will be sent a link in your confirmation for program access. To contact Stephen Lyn or buy one of his UT Press books, go to Instagram @stephenlynbales.

Institute of Agriculture also provides instruction, research and public service through the UT Herbert College of Agriculture, the UT College of Veterinary Medicine, UT AgResearch and UT Extension offices, with locations in every county in the state. To learn more about the Arboretum Society or for questions on this program, go to
www.utarboretumsociety.org or contact mcampani@utk.edu.

KCG's next Online Open Mic Night will be Thursday, February 11, 2021, at 6:30 PM. At our last open mic we enjoyed almost an hour of beautiful music. We invite you to join us, as a participant and/or a viewer.

Sign up for Open Mic Night: https://forms.zohopublic.com/legrandmusicstudios/form/BasicSignup/formperma/1lwy7L4EvGPHglFjGNRSdePmUCOF7L9_jwySOFC_QvE

https://knoxvilleclassicalguitar.com/

Thursday 6-7 PM
Knoxville College
on Zoom

The following week we’ll be honored to welcome civil rights leader, pioneer Black politician, and historical author Robert Booker, who will be talking about the remarkable history of his alma mater, Knoxville College, the landmark institution of higher learning for African Americans that caught the attention of Black leaders from Frederick Douglass to Booker T. Washington to W.E.B. Dubois to Martin Luther King, all of whom lectured there—and that even today refuses to give up. KC has lately been in limbo, but things are stirring.

Join Jack Neely and staff each week for a new topic on Knoxville's rich and fascinating history. For more information and to register for this week's chat please visit https://knoxvillehistoryproject.org/events/

Knoxville History Project, 516 West Vine Avenue #8, Knoxville, TN 37902. Information: 865-300-4559

Early Black Literary Community and Generational Uplift
Prof. Brigitte Fielder (U of Wisconsin) delivers the public plenary for UTK's Frederick Douglass Day Celebration

Registration for this event is required: https://calendar.utk.edu/event/early_black_literary_community_and_generational_uplift#.YCFdCGhKjcs

Thursday, February 11 at 3:30pm to 5:00pm via Zoom
Presented by www.douglassday.org

YouTube - Behind the Scenes - "I can't breathe"
This Thursday, Feb. 11 at 6pm EST

Join us on Youtube for a Behind the Scenes look into the creation of new opera, "I can't breathe"

Meet the creators, Brandon Gibson & Leslie Burrs

https://www.YouTube.com/MarbleCityOpera

Join us for our next critical conversation on race this Thursday, February 11th at noon on zoom! Zoom link: https://tennessee.zoom.us/j/91737853442

Professor Brian Krumm will lead a discussion on Racism and Anti-Racism in Corporate America with guest speaker, Crystal Ashby, who is currently the Interim President and CEO of The Executive Leadership Council, and was a former senior executive with BP.

The Executive Leadership Council is the preeminent membership organization for Black CEOs, board directors, and senior executives. The Council aims “to open channels of opportunity for Black executives to positively impact business and communities.”

For more information about Crystal Ashby and her work: https://www.elcinfo.com/staff/crystal-ashby/

The Sacred, the Secular, and the Space In Between: African-American Vernacular Art from the Collection of Michael D. Hill

This exhibit showcases the work of self-taught African American artists who examine the intersections of spirituality and material culture. Guided by a compulsion, in some cases even what might be seen as a divine calling, to create, they produced paintings, sculpture, and utilitarian objects that are startlingly powerful in both their aesthetic forms and the life force they channel. Among the artists featured in this exhibit are Mose Tolliver, David Butler, Lonnie Holley, and Mary T. Smith. Their work may also be found in such prominent collections as the High Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Guided gallery tours by Michael D. Hill will be held throughout the month. For more information, please contact Bryan Wilkerson at 865-354-3000 x4788 or by email at wilkersonbs@roanestate.edu.

O'Brien Art Gallery at Roane State Community College, OBrien Building room 276 Patton Lane Harriman, TN 37748
http://academics.roanestate.edu/art/gallery/

Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers: 2020-21 Season

FREE screening available for 4 days including Q&A with filmmaker.

The Hawaiian island of Kauai is seen as a paradise of leisure and pristine natural beauty, but these escapist fantasies obscure the colonial displacement, hyper-exploitation of workers, and destructive environmental extraction that have actually shaped life on the island for the last 250 years.

Cane Fire critically examines the island’s history—and the various strategies by which Hollywood has represented it—through four generations of director Anthony Banua-Simon’s family, who first immigrated to Kauai from the Phillipines to work on the sugar plantations. Assembled from a diverse array of sources—from Banua-Simon’s observational footage, to amateur YouTube travelogues, to epic Hollywood dance sequences—Cane Fire offers a kaleidoscopic portrait of the economic and cultural forces that have cast indigenous and working-class residents as “extras” in their own story.

https://www.claytonartscenter.com/event/cane-fire-documentary/?instance_id=8707

This year's theme is "On the Bright Side". Open to women artists of any medium!

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

The online-only retrospective exhibition titled “STAYING CONNECTED: The Valentines of Jim Balderes, Jr.” will be available for viewing from Saturday February 6 through Sunday February 28, 2021 at the Greeneville Arts Council website greenevilleartscouncil.org under the Mason House Gallery Online: Current Exhibit section.

Balderes has been sharing valentines of his own creation with friends and family for nearly forty years. The first was produced in a darkroom during his senior year at Cornell University where he earned a BS degree in Design and Environmental Analysis. Since then he’s seen Valentine’s Day as a regular opportunity to reach out at a time of year when family, friends, neighbors, colleagues and former colleagues could all use a bit of “handmade” warmth and whimsy.

During a two-decade career in corporate interior design and project management in New York City, both his mailing list and the variety of media for the yearly missive grew – thanks, in part, to a few classes at the School of Visual Arts and the significant transformation in digital media during those years. The various media for his valentines have included drawing, painting, photography, sculpture and digital art. Some of the greeting cards (primarily postcards) involved the use of custom-made tools and materials such as rubber stamps, die-cuts, candies and even scratch-and-sniff stickers.

Coincidentally, this year’s mailing is Balderes’ fourteenth since moving to East Tennessee. It becomes more important to him each year to send a tangible, physical greeting card when social media and email messages seem to be a step too removed. “Not only am I proudly supporting the ever-important U.S. Postal Service, but people would have a really hard time sticking a Facebook, Instagram or Twitter post to the refrigerator,” says Balderes. Balderes with the valentines he sent in 2007, his first after moving to Greene County. “And especially now, as we continue to contend with a worldwide pandemic, ‘Staying Connected’ safely is paramount. It is with that sentiment in mind, and as an expression of unceasing appreciation for all of our healthcare workers, that I made this year’s valentine.”

For information on Greeneville Arts Council exhibits, please contact Til Green, director of exhibitions, at 423-329-5366 or tilgreen724@yahoo.com.