Calendar of Events

Join us for a celebration of beer, Knoxville style!
THE WORLD'S FAIR PARK LAKE IN KNOXVILLE, TN
Net proceeds of the Fest benefit CureDuchenne

https://knoxvillebrewfest.com/

Linda Parsons's sixth collection, Valediction, will launch on Saturday, June 24, 3 pm, Union Ave Books in Knoxville.

The words, both poetry and prose, are of traveling inward as well as outward, of new beginning as well as goodbye (for valediction is the act of saying goodbye). The book is available at https://madvillepublishing.com/product/valediction/, Amazon, and soon Union Ave Books.

Linda Parsons has written a book we sorely need—lyric meditations composed with an impeccable ear, explorations of family love and loss, flowering and decline, sunderings and difficult reunion. Combining sure-handed verse with prose poems of drastic intensity, Valediction reminds us the world is a cutting garden worthy of relentless tending and care. These hard-won poems are the harvest of a talent in high season.
—Bobby C. Rogers, author of Shift Work

For the poet, a garden is world enough. The bee, the singed leaf, the needful dirt, the worm. The tiger lily, fireworks. The moss, its slug. We may enter our gardens thinking we will control the earth, curate it, but we walk out realizing that we’re just another bug with song. (Thank God.) In Valediction the master Tennessean poet Linda Parsons gives us not just her song but the whole oratorio—out from the center of her Knoxville yard she broadcasts the glory of her evening hour, joining in with cicadas and hawks, figs and frost, black widows, and all the ghosts of her ascendants living inside her, the perfect cacophony of love. This book is transcendent.
—Rebecca Gayle Howell, author of American Purgatory

Union Ave Books, 517 Union Avenue, Knoxville, TN 37902. Information: 865-951-2180, www.unionavebooks.com

Author Terry Shaw & photographer Kelly Norrell bring to Union Ave Books "a book about people, their love of gardening, and what we can learn from them," EAST TENNESEE GARDEN STORIES.

This event will take place on June 24 from 10 am - 12 pm at 517 Union Ave.
https://www.unionavebooks.com/event/author-meet-greet-terry-shaw-kelly-norrell

Union Ave Books, 517 Union Avenue, Knoxville, TN 37902. Information: 865-951-2180, www.unionavebooks.com

With Broken Vessel Studios

Join us for the Knoxville Botanical Garden’s celebration of Juneteenth as we honor the tradition and history of Black soapmaking. Local small herbalism and skincare business, Broken Vessel Studios, will give a one-hour conversational lecture, with time afterward for questions and the chance to learn more about their work and products for sale.

June 24th, 10-11:30a
Preregistration is required: https://www.knoxgarden.org/events-all/history-of-black-soapmaking

Knoxville Botanical Garden and Arboretum, 2743 Wimpole Ave, Knoxville, TN 37914. Hours: Gardens open daily from sunrise to sunset. Information: 865-862-8717, www.knoxgarden.org

Saturday, June 24, 2023
11:00 AM - 2:00 PM
Strong Stock Farm, 8220 Rutledge Pike, Knoxville, TN, 37924

YPK is proud to announce that the Second Annual YPK Giving Brunch will support Nourish Knoxville. Nourish Knoxville, Inc. is a Knoxville-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization cultivating healthy communities by supporting relationships between local farmers, producers, and the public.

Join us on June 24, 2023, for a farm-to-table experience at the picturesque Strong Stock Farm. Brunch will be served on the porch by Ham N’ Goody’s and mimosas will be available from Drink Box. General admission includes brunch and a drink ticket. Leadership Circle includes additional drink tickets, recognition during the event, Nourish Knoxville Sticker, recognition in the Nourish Knoxville Annual Food Guide, two tickets to the Friends and Farmers party, and more exclusive opportunities to connect with Nourish Knoxville.

General Admission $50
https://www.ypknox.com/upcoming-events/2023/5/4/giving-brunch#!event-register/2023/6/24/giving-brunch

Make some eco-friendly prints with The Big Camera at Mead's Quarry during an Ijams invasive species removal workday!
Jun 24, 9:30 AM – 12:30 PM
Mead's Quarry, Mead's Quarry Lake, Knoxville, TN 37920, USA

Take Action! and join Ijams and The Big Camera to make ecologically-minded art from invasive species removed by volunteers at Mead's Quarry! Using developer made from invasive plants, The Big Camera will teach you to make art prints from these species. You'll work using the sunshine, sumac, vinegar, salt, and water to create a couple of smaller images and, depending on turn-out, a large print to take home! This is a FREE event, and as part of this workday, the plan is to document invasive species removal happening at Ijams as part of an ongoing partnership. Come explore!

This event is part of Ijams Nature Center's 2023 Take Action! series. Take Action! is a year-round conservation effort that strives to educate local communities to the different issues surrounding sustainability; empower individuals to live, shop, create, and explore more sustainably; and cultivate a culture that celebrates sustainable practices and initiatives, of all sizes, every day.

2915 Island Home Ave., Knoxville, TN 37920
865-577-4717 or https://www.ijams.org/event-details/take-action-eco-printing-and-invasive-species-at-ijams-with-the-big-camera

SPECIAL EVENT: JAMFEST 2023

Join in the fun at Ijams for the 4th Annual JAMFEST 2023 on June 24! Bring a lawn chair/blanket and rock out with five great, local bands on the Visitor Center lawn! Food, drinks and merchandise will be available for purchase from food trucks, the Ijams beer garden and the Visitor Center. No coolers or outside alcohol are allowed. Dogs are allowed but must remain on a leash the entire time and you must clean up after them.

Lineup
6-6:45 For the Birds
7-7:45 French Toast
8-8:45 Civil Strife
9-9:45 Red Vinyl Gypsies
10-10:45 Quartjar
Doors for this event open at 5 pm; music starts at 6. Tickets are $15 per person; kids under 10 are free.

2915 Island Home Ave., Knoxville, TN 37920
865-577-4717 or https://www.ijams.org/event-details/special-event-jamfest-2023

By John Cariani

“Sweet, poignant, and witty. Nearly perfect. ALMOST, MAINE’s charm is real. [It] packs wit, earns its laughs and, like love, surprises you.” —New York Daily News.

Friday-Saturday, June 23-24 at 7:30 and Sunday, June 25 at 3:00, at Theatre Knoxville Downtown (800 S. Central Street, Knoxville.)

http://www.freespirittheatre.org/

Smoky Mountain Quilters of Tennessee 42nd Quilt Show & Competition
Knoxville Expo Center, 5441 Clinton Highway, Knoxville, TN 37912

Friday, June 23, 2023, 9am-5pm; Saturday, June 24, 2023, 9am-4pm

Daily admission, $10; 2-day pass, $15; Children under 12, free

More than 200 quilts on display. On Friday, Merikay Waldvogel, a nationally known quilt collector, researcher and writer, will present an antique quilt turning at 11am and 1 pm. Shop vendors and a boutique of unique items handcrafted by guild members. Scavenger hunts for the young ones. Quilt appraisals by appointment: contact certified appraiser Cindy Stuart at 865-386-0940. Free parking.

For more information, email info@smokymtnquilters.com.
www.smokymtnquilters.com or follow us on Facebook.

Cedar Bluff Branch: Friday, June 23 and Saturday, June 24, 10-5

Friends of the Knox County Public Library: 865-215-8775 or www.knoxfriends.org/

 ECO TONE
COURTNEY EGAN FEATURING COLLABORATIONS WITH NATORI GREEN

OPENING RECEPTION & MEET THE ARTIST
FRIDAY, JUNE 16 • 5:30-7:30PM • CASH BAR

Eco Tone is a show of Courtney Egan's botanically-themed, projected artworks from 2020 to present, including new pieces made in collaboration with artist Natori Green. Egan’s installations deliver an experience that is both pleasing and disconcerting. The ethereal projections–converging on walls, floors and sculptural elements, and occasionally interactive–are inspired by the growing frequency of human exposure to nature via computers or television. Egan creates stunning yet “subtly impossible, hybrid tableaus” that envelop the viewer in a conversation between memory of the natural world and a new experience with a plant or flower. Egan explains the fundamental irony of the experience, stating, “We get closer and farther away from the natural world simultaneously when we experience it through a technological lens.”

Courtney Egan is a New Orleans-based digital media artist, photographer, and naturalist who blends botanical art with sculpture and digital technologies. www.courtneyegan.net

FREE & Open to the Public!

Knoxville Museum of Art, 1050 World's Fair Park, Knoxville, TN 37916. Hours: Tu-Sa 10-5, Su 1-5. Information: 865-525-6101, www.knoxart.org. Admission and parking are free.

Free and open to the public

Reception Friday, June 16, 2023, 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. Artist talk at 6:30 p.m.

In The Power of Water, Clinard focuses on the intensity and energy of waterfalls, waves and rivers. Her richly hued work is created by using watercolor in a loose and flowing manner and often on Yupo paper, which keeps the pigments on the surface and creates an intense, vivid result.

Lil Clinard is a landscape artist and watercolorist who has won three “Best of Show” awards in the Tennessee Artists’ Association Annual Juried Shows. Clinard is a signature member of the Tennessee Watercolor Society and Knoxville Watercolor Society, as well as a member of the American, National and Transparent watercolor societies. Visit her website for more information: www.WatercolorsByLil.com

Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, 2931 Kingston Pike, Knoxville, TN 37919. Gallery hours: M-Th 10-3, Su 10-12:30. Information: 865-523-4176, www.tvuuc.org