Calendar of Events

The Arts & Culture Alliance is pleased to present four new exhibitions at the Emporium Center in downtown Knoxville from March 1-30, 2024. A free gathering with the artists will take place on Friday, March 1, from 5:00-9:00 PM and features music by Tinca Tinca.

Mac Bartine, George Denninger & Cosima Risolvo-Aryee: The Upstairs Show: An Elevated View
Mac Bartine uses fluid layers of color, movement and form to explore the imagination and our connections to emotion and the natural world. He strives to create works that invite personal interpretations and celebrations of our own experiences with life and creativity. Bartine is a life-long East Tennessee resident who grew up in Roane County. His mother is a professional musician, which led to his life-long passion for music and art. Bartine has a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from Berry College and an Master of Science in Organizational Psychology from the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga. Today, he leads Smartria, a software company based in Knoxville, and is the lead singer and songwriter of local band Chameleous. This is his first public show of his paintings. www.bartine.com

Although George Denninger has had many interests, artistic expression was his first love as a child. In his career, he has been an aerospace engineer, an industrial and home designer, a college professor, a gallery owner, a motivational speaker, and an author. Denninger has exhibited nationally, including the Renwick Gallery in the Smithsonian American Art Museum and The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City where his work is part of their permanent collection. He has owned galleries in Sugar Loaf, NY and St. Charles, MO. "Art is an expression of Soul. The more we know of Soul, the fuller and clearer the expression of art. True art is the response emanating one's identity." www.georgedenninger.com

Cosima Risolvo-Aryee was born in Taranto, Italy, a gulf city in the Ionian Sea where she spent long days at the beach absorbing the beauty, serenity and high energy of the sea; these days undoubtedly inspired her creativity, imagery and soul of her work. At age twelve, her family moved to northern Illinois and at age eighteen, she served in the U.S. Army. She later attended the School of Art and Design at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale where she earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts with a double major in Painting and Drawing. In 2017, she began painting and exhibiting again, and her residence and art studio are currently located in East Tennessee. She works mainly in oils, occasionally using watercolors, pastel and charcoal. "My work is completely intuitive. Although you may almost recognize spaces, places and things in my work, my aim is not to render known objects. My aim is to express myself intuitively and authentically by following creative impulses, through which celestial blues illuminate some paintings and marine blues inundate others. I’m frequently told the spaces I create in my paintings are otherworldly and sometimes surreal. My approach to my artmaking is to tap into the wonder of the essence of subjects like light, portals, and energetic spaces; I am always surprised at what comes through me onto the canvas." www.cosimas.art

The exhibitions will be on display at the Emporium Center, 100 S. Gay Street, Knoxville, TN 37902. The Emporium is open to the public Monday-Thursday, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM; Friday, 9:00 AM – 7:00 PM; and Saturday, 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM. Please note, the Emporium will be closed on Friday, March 29. Most of the works on exhibition will be for sale and may be purchased by visiting in person or the online shop at www.knoxalliance.store. For more information, please see www.knoxalliance.com or call (865) 523-7543.

The Arts & Culture Alliance is pleased to present four new exhibitions at the Emporium Center in downtown Knoxville from March 1-30, 2024. A free gathering with the artists will take place on Friday, March 1, from 5:00-9:00 PM and features music by Tinca Tinca.

In honor of National Quilting Day on March 16, members of the Smoky Mountain Quilters of Tennessee (SMQ) are mounting an exhibit of more than 30 stunning quilts which illustrate the breadth of hand and machine techniques and the many reasons for making a quilt. Some are prize-winning works of art, while others were made for pleasure and daily use. Every quilt has a story behind it, and each quilter shares the inspiration for their creation as part of the exhibition. For example, one quilt commemorates 30 years of work by missionaries to translate the Bible into the native language for the people of Papua, New Guinea. Another quilter used leaves collected from her birthplace in Norway for a resist dyeing technique. A third SMQ member worked on a quilt depicting the promise of recovery while her younger sister was being treated for breast cancer.

“This exhibition is a celebration of the diverse talent of our membership and the many reasons we quilt,” said Merikay Waldvogel, SMQ member and the exhibition organizer. “None of us quilt solely for ourselves; it is a way to express our feelings through our art and to communicate with others when words are not enough. We hope this exhibit helps increase understanding of how quilts enhance our lives and bring us pleasure and comfort, whether we are the makers or the recipients of these beautiful works.”

The SMQ Educational Fund in memory of Peggy Garwood, a long-time member and master quilter, is underwriting the exhibition. SMQ typically meets on the first Tuesday of each month at 6:30 PM at Messiah Lutheran Church in Knoxville. SMQ strives to: advance the knowledge and appreciation of the craftsmanship, artistic expression, and historical significance of quiltmaking; sponsor and support charitable projects to provide encouragement to those in need; and promote friendship through shared activities. SMQ’s approximately 100 members range from novice to master quilters in diverse quilt styles, including traditional and art quilts, complex and minimalist modern designs, miniatures and bed-sized, and hand- or machine-stitched. For more information about Smoky Mountain Quilters of Tennessee, email info@smokymtnquilters.com. www.smokymtnquilters.com and www.facebook.com/smokymountainquiltersoftn

The exhibitions will be on display at the Emporium Center, 100 S. Gay Street, Knoxville, TN 37902. The Emporium is open to the public Monday-Thursday, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM; Friday, 9:00 AM – 7:00 PM; and Saturday, 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM. Please note, the Emporium will be closed on Friday, March 29. Most of the works on exhibition will be for sale and may be purchased by visiting in person or the online shop at www.knoxalliance.store. For more information, please see www.knoxalliance.com or call (865) 523-7543.

Join us on March 1st from 5 PM to 9 PM for the Astrid Galindo Student Art Show/Competition, featuring the creativity of talented local young artists ages 15 to 20. During the evening exhibit on Friday, attendees will have the opportunity to cast their votes for their favorite artwork. The top three winners will receive cash prizes.

https://holahoralatina.org/current-exhibit/
https://www.facebook.com/events/390518603341651/

HoLa Hora Latina, 100 S. Gay Street, Suite 112, Knoxville, TN 37902. Information: 865-335-3358, www.holahoralatina.org

Solo show by Margaret Scanlan in the gallery, opens Fri Mar 1
Champagne Saturday from 11 AM - 4 PM, meet the artist from 1-3 PM

Bennett, 5308 Kingston Pike, Knoxville, TN 37919. Hours: M-Sa 10-5:30. Information: 865-584-6791, https://bennetthome.com

Dubbed “the assembly-line Picasso” by Time magazine, Steve Keene’s vibrant and engaging paintings emerge from a punk-rock ethos that upends the usual conventions of the art world. Working from his Brooklyn studio, Keene creates 50+ paintings each day, producing over 300,000 pieces during a career that now spans more than 30 years.

The revolutionary Steve Keene will join the Big Ears Festival (Mar 21-24) with a live, experiential painting performance. Keene will have a pop-up studio, RED Gallery in Knoxville’s historic Old City, for people to watch him create dozens of pieces at a time, with his iconic process, usually painted in series of four- or six-of-a-kind. He utilizes quick-drying acrylic paints and a screen-printing technique of moving from broad swaths of color and gradually moving to the more detailed work.

As a prelude to Steve Keene’s live painting appearance at Big Ears, the festival is presenting the debut of The Hirschhorn Collection's “Paintings by Steve Keene.” This expansive exhibition of some of his rarer works will open on March 1 and continue through March 29 in at the RED Gallery, located on Jackson Ave in Knoxville’s Old City.

Make sure to visit the gallery during your stay to watch him work!

RED Gallery, 130 W. Jackson Ave, Knoxville, TN 37902. Information: 865-524-0146 or https://www.facebook.com/REDgalleryKNOX/

Knoxville Watercolor Society Exhibition
Art Exhibit at Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church
Free and open to the public
When: Reception Friday, February 16, 2024, 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. Artists’ talks at 6:30 p.m.

Gallery hours: 9:30-4:30 Monday through Thursday and 9:00-1:00 Sunday
2931 Kingston Pike, Knoxville, TN 37918

Knoxville Watercolor Society: Passionate About Art
For more than 60 years, the Knoxville Watercolor Society (KWS) has provided area watercolor artists, students and supporters with the only local art organization dedicated to the practice, advancement, and promotion of watercolor as a serious art form. KWS enjoys a long-standing reputation for the artistic excellence, expertise, passion, and mutual support of its members. Membership in KWS is open to all Knoxville area residents 18+, including experienced water-media artists, aspiring or developing water-media artists, art teachers, art students, patrons of the arts, representatives of arts organizations, and vendors. For more information, go to https://knoxvillewatercolorsociety.weebly.com/ or https://www.facebook.com/knoxville.watercolor.society/

February – March 2024

Sonia Jackson Summers received her Bachelors in College Scholars: Illustration and Writing from The University of Tennessee in 2008. During her time at the University of Tennessee, Sonia cartooned for “The Daily Beacon.”

In 2011, Sonia married and relocated to her husband’s hometown of Birmingham, Alabama, and during that time Sonia was commissioned to participate in Vulcan Park and Museum’s public art project called “Vulcans on Parade.” Sonia’s painted Vulcan statues stand on display in two downtown Birmingham businesses. Sonia has work in the permanent collection of The Joy Gallery in Homewood, Alabama and rotating art at the Blue Phrog Gallery in Montevallo, Alabama.

Since moving back to Knoxville with her husband and kids in 2019, Sonia has broadened her scope to include painting en plein air (live on-site landscape painting), as well as competitive sidewalk chalk art/“Madonnari” festivals and sidewalk chalk art commissions, in addition to her fine art, illustration, and murals. Sonia has a deep appreciation for Impressionism, focusing on bridging the relationship between observation and interpretation, impressionistic capabilities of skill and realistic reaction in rendering. Sonia enjoys public art such as murals and sidewalk chalk for their ability to make art accessible to everyone.

In 2023 Sonia accepted the Fine Arts Teaching position at Chesterton Academy, a new classical high school in Knoxville. She also teaches recreational art classes at Painting with a Twist in Farragut.

Sonia’s art can be seen in sidewalk chalk/madonnari festivals, such as the Dogwood Arts Chalk Walk, through exhibitions with both the Arts and Culture Alliance and Dogwood Arts, and she currently has a mural featured by Dogwood Arts in Strong Alley in downtown Knoxville.

https://knoxbijou.org/community-outreach-2/art-gallery/

MAIN GALLERY
Reception Feb. 2, 5-8 PM
https://andrewscottross.com/home.html
https://tristararts.org/the-gallery/f/a-drawing-of-a-lion-shaped-by-fear

Tri-Star Arts at Candoro Marble Building, 4450 Candora Drive, Knoxville, TN 37920. Hours: Tu-Sa 11-5. Information: https://tristararts.org/visit

First Friday February 2nd 6-9pm at Relay Ridge

-Jenn Kaplan "No Sudden Movements" opening gallery reception
-Open Artist Studios
-Printmaking demos/artist features in the printshop

Jennifer Kaplan invites participants to slow down and listen to the nuances of verbal and nonverbal communication. This show emphasizes the isolated gestures of touch through a progression blend of functional and figurative forms, giving shape to that which exists inside us and has been shapeless. Clay has the capacity to communicate what cannot be said, what is unspeakable, where words fail.

“Where I End and You Begin” are a series of entangled bodies which follow the gestural action of hands folding into one another, signing in motions of tenderness, reception, and formal fluidity. These tangled masses are finished in waxes and chalk, raw and bright, or crater glazes, molten and encrusted, with blurred edges, to amplify the soft strength of vulnerable participation within a community.

Everything is connected and survival is en masse. Hope lives not in isolation but through the potential of collaborative movement. Jennifer’s ceramic practice acts as a filter for understanding cycles of grief and regrowth, encouraging the potential within collaborative action and mutual aid.

We invite you to engage your senses in the relational works but please, be gentle.

Relay Ridge, 4124 McKinley St, Knoxville. https://relayridge.org/ and https://www.instagram.com/relay_ridge/

Artist Carmen Winant’s large-scale collages and installations illuminate the often-invisible experiences of women, as well as feminist strategies for survival, revolt, and self-determination. She explores these themes through objects drawn from and inspired by the archives of Women in Transition (WIT) and the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence (NCADV).

“I am a photographer who no longer makes her own images. My work revisits and recontextualizes the feminist histories that preceded my own, reaching backward as an attempt to understand the space between our lived experiences, and the larger, if nuanced and sometimes contradictory, aims of women’s liberation. As such the found photographs that run throughout my work — integrated into books, installations, billboards, or discrete objects — are not evidence of a history, but in fact its very living residue. These projects, all of which work to unravel foreclosed histories, often take the form of ad hoc archives and pay particular interest to women’s power, pleasure, labor, and self-actualization. Lately I’ve turned towards imagination, optimism, and joy as shared, necessary tools of the artist and the revolutionary.” —Carmen Winant (December 2020)

Content warning: please be advised that this exhibition contains adult content, including depictions and descriptions of domestic violence.

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.

Inspired by Women in Transition's "Clothesline Project", the YWCA worked with their clients to make their own t-shirts, which are on display in the 3rd floor lobby.

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.

PROJECT SPACE
special reception Jan. 19, 2024
https://tristararts.org/the-gallery/f/one-solitude-speaking

Tri-Star Arts at Candoro Marble Building, 4450 Candora Drive, Knoxville, TN 37920. Hours: Tu-Sa 11-5. Information: https://tristararts.org/visit