Calendar of Events

Come join us for the 56th annual on Saturday, December 14 at 3pm, Sunday, December, 15 at 3pm, and Monday, December, 16 at 7pm. The floor of the Civic Coliseum will become the towns of Nazareth and Bethlehem as we reenact the birth story of Jesus Christ in a 1 hour production featuring a 150 voice choir, a 150 member cast, a full orchestra, and a stable of live animals. Bring the entire family to celebrate together as we remind ourselves how the Prince of Peace entered this world.

Admission is free.
Doors will open 1 hour prior to show time.

http://knoxvillenativity.com/

Tour de Lights is presented by Visit Knoxville and Bike Walk Knoxville! Prepare to immerse yourself in holiday joy with Tour de Lights, the fantastic, free, and family-friendly holiday bike ride presented by Visit Knoxville and Bike Walk Knoxville. Tour de Lights serves as a unifying celebration, engaging neighborhoods, local businesses, and the community, who gather to bask in the festive atmosphere. We encourage all participants to get into the holiday spirit by decorating themselves and their bikes.

Email: bikewalkknox@gmail.com
https://www.bwknox.org/tourdelights

The show for kids and kids at heart!
WDVX Kidstuff Live
Saturday, December 14th at 10am
Come see us for a free show at Visit Knoxville featuring Will Carter with host Sean McCollough

WDVX, 301 S. Gay Street, Knoxville, TN 37902. Information: 865-544-1029, www.wdvx.com

Come to Norris Dam December 14 for a vintage evening celebrating the Christmas season! This event will feature warm drinks, live folk music, family-friendly crafts, silent auctions, a bonfire, and Santa is planning on making a visit. This free holiday event will be Saturday, December 14th from 5:00pm to 8:30pm at the Lenoir Museum, Grist Mill, and Threshing Barn. Parking will be at the Lenoir Museum, located at 2121 Norris Freeway, with limited handicap accessible parking at the Rice Gristmill.

We will be collecting non-perishable food donations for local Norris food banks. Please consider bringing a canned food item to support your local community.

A silent pie auction will be held from 4:00pm to 7:00pm at the Crosby Threshing Barn! Support Norris Dam State Park and take home a tasty treat; it's a win-win! You do NOT have to be present to win- winners will be announced or called at 7:00pm on the dot!
(If you wish to donate a pie for this auction, please email holly.frerichs@tn.gov)

Kiddos can meet at the bonfire pit in front of the Threshing Barn at 5:30pm, 6:30pm, and 7:30pm to "Read with a Ranger" where one of our Park Rangers will read aloud a Christmas story. The Barn will also house "make your own ornament" stations!

Live music will be in the Lenoir Museum, along with historic crafts.

Norris Dam State Park, 2121 Norris Fwy, Andersonville, TN 37828-3044
https://www.facebook.com/norrisdamstatepark

Friday, December 13 5-9 PM
Saturday, December 14 10 AM - 5 PM

Along with our resident artists and open studios, we will be hosting these guest artists:

Karen Noggle - Leather belts, pouches, vases, sculpture
Ellen Robinette - Canvas flat trees and puppets
Tina Rosling - Functional pottery
Mary Neitling - Upcycled clothing and accessories

Door Prizes and Refreshments!

Broadway Studios and Gallery, 1127 Broadway St, Knoxville, TN 37917. Information: 865-556-8676, www.BroadwayStudiosAndGallery.com and www.facebook.com/broadwaystudiosandgallery/

LISA KURTZ: lkhighlandpottery@gmail.com
CYNTHIA TIPTON: ctiptonart@icloud.com

Featuring art for gift giving for sale by 6 local artists, hor d’oeuvres & holiday cheer! Free and Open to the Public

Local Artists participating: Lisa Kurtz, Shannon Davis Brock, Sheila Rauen, Cynthia Yeager, Cynthia Tipton and Betsy Heerdt

Dates: Friday, December 13th from 1-8pm and Saturday, December 14th from 11am-4pm

Location: 5410 Homberg Drive, Suite 9, Knoxville, TN 37919 (across the parking lot from the Southern Market)

Art for Sale: pottery, paintings, prints, jewelry, fiber art, sculpture by 6 local artists

Connect with Knoxville’s maker community! Come back often for our ever-changing schedule of maker presentations, performances, markets and meet-ups. https://www.makerexchangeknox.com/happenings/

December 10, 9:30AM - 3:30PM Artist in Action – Valerie Pearce
December 10, 12:00PM - 8:00PM Artist in Action – Brian Melton
December 10, 3:30PM - 7:00PM Artist in Action – Deana Fulton
December 10, 5:00PM - 11:00PM Tavern Notes: Live Music at Maker Exchange (5:00-11:00 PM) Willow Osborne, Jesse Blue Eads, & Cody Bauer
December 11, 10:00AM - 3:00PM Artist in Action – Brian Melton
December 11, 5:00PM - 7:00PM Tavern Notes: Live Music at Maker Exchange (5:00-7:00 PM) Fiddles and Flatpicks
December 13, 5:00PM - 7:00PM Tavern Notes: Live Music at Maker Exchange (5:00-7:00 PM) Holiday Carolers
December 20, 5:00PM - 7:00PM Tavern Notes: Live Music at Maker Exchange (5:00-7:00 PM) Holiday Carolers

CURATED BY DOGWOOD ARTS AT WORLD’S FAIR PARK
710 Clinch Avenue, Knoxville TN 37902
General · Makers: 865-637-4561
Tavern: 865-934-2983
Coffee Shop: 865-934-2985
Event Space · Sales: 865-934-2963
info@makerexchangeknox.com

Reception Dec 13, 6-7:30 PM with artist's talks at 6:30 PM
Art Exhibit at Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church
Free and open to the public

Yvonne Dalschen
After living for over 20 years in the “Secret City” of the Manhattan Project, I never learned how to stop worrying and love the bomb. I am surrounded by fences and signs, atomic nostalgia, selective amnesia and heritage tourism, and I sometimes seem to be the only one bothered by this. “Ghosts of the Manhattan Project” started during the clean-up of K-25. This uranium enrichment plant in Oak Ridge was the largest building in the world when built in 1944. My work is an ongoing exploration of the landscapes and archives of the atomic age, layering histories with observations into photographic palimpsests. I picture the invisible and the unthinkable, collecting the choices and promises made, the stories told, the stories forgotten and the fears that haunt us at night.

Yvonne Dalschen is a German photographer living in Oak Ridge, TN. She is interested in history of place, cultural landscapes and digital experimentation. She earned an MA in Comparative Literature from the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich and a Photography Certificate from the University of Tennessee. Her images haven been exhibited nationally and internationally from Oak Ridge to Sydney, Australia, recently at the Knoxville Museum of Art, The Bascom Center and UGA’s Circle Gallery.

Debby Hall
“The Joy of Color” features paintings reflecting the artistry in nature through color and the spontaneity of alcohol inks and watercolors. Whether painting abstracts or more realistic mountains, flowers, landscapes or birds, Hall hopes her paintings bring people joy and a greater connection to the beauty around us.

Debby Hall is a self-taught artist whose paintings were juried into the Oak Ridge Art Center’s Open Show (September 2023) and the “Arts in the Airport” Spring 2024 show, where she received the Award of Merit. She exhibits often through Knoxville’s Arts & Culture Alliance and the St. Lucie Culture Alliance. She donates net proceeds from art sales to a non-profit charity, Saving Grace in Uganda, that rescues young homeless street children and gives them medical care, food, education, housing and hope in a country with virtually no social services. For more information visit her website, https://artforsavinggrace.com

Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, 2931 Kingston Pike, Knoxville, TN 37919. Gallery hours: M-Th 9:30-4:30, Su 9-1. Information: 865-523-4176, www.tvuuc.org

First Friday Reception: December 6th, 5:30 - 9 pm
December Featured Artists

Claire Bodnaruk, Glass
A Native Tennessean, Claire Bodnaruk has lived in Australia, Florida, Minnesota and Chicago, before returning to her home state of Tennessee in 2019. Following a career in advertising, film & video production, she explored different creative outlets while raising her two daughters. Claire has been working in glass for over 20 years. Her journey in glass began with becoming proficient in metal fabrication, incorporating colorful glass into unique jewelry. During travels to London, France and Italy, she was inspired by the beautiful Venetian and stained glass art that led to exploring glass on a larger scale. Learning from recognized glass artists across the United States in glass blowing to glass fusing, Claire’s current focus is in kiln formed glass, the manipulation of shaping glass in a kiln with heat and gravity. The process to produce one piece may involve several firings with many hours in the cycle, multiple techniques and manipulations, and cold working for a quality finish. Her work is both functional and nonfunctional glass art.

Allen Monsarrat, Painting
Allen’s art education began with three years training in architecture, but finished with a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree with a concentration in pottery at the Memphis College of Art. His first art career was as a studio potter in Friendsville, Tn for 25 years. That was followed by careers in decorative wall finishes, faux painting, cabinetry finishing and the occasional mural project. It was studying “trompe l’oiel” (fool the eye) imagery with French master craftsman Michel Nadai that nurtured his interest in creating representational art. “Creating a painting is always an exciting journey. I am never certain whether a painting will be as successful as I have envisioned it in my mind. I am more than a decade into developing my representational painting skills. I have honed my methodology into a procedure of how I develop a painting by breaking it into manageable steps. First choosing a subject with personal meaning based on my travels or a subject close to home here in East Tennessee. But the image must be a strong composition and contain a range of tonal values from darks to lights. This is worked out by doing an under painting by using only one color to establish a range of values. At this point I can concentrate on colors and brush application. Brush application refers to how apparent or not are the actual brush strokes. Slowly edging away from my original tendency toward photorealism, some of my new work has a more painterly feel to it. Yet, like a photograph, it retains a great deal of detail.
I have always been a student of art. The continuing passion I have for art is that I will never stop learning.”

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, www.Facebook.com/ArtMarketGallery

Friday, December 6 from 6-8 Awaken Coffee will host an opening reception for Hannah Doss and Laura Woodson.

Hannah’s latest body of work reflects a renewed journey of learning and discovery, inspired by a fascination with resin techniques she encountered in a recent class. Hannah’s art predominantly explores wildlife, nature, and portraiture, inviting viewers to pause and savor the intricate beauty of life's small details.

In Laura’s recent work she has navigated her bold use of color with fine line drawings. She uses coffee filters as the foundation of her work and experiments with how color is affected by water. This process creates a watercolor effect that never creates the same pattern twice. Once she has created her vivid backgrounds, she creates fine line drawings of flowers to re-envision the nature we see in real life. She works to evoke joy in each new piece she produces.

Please join us for some amazing art and of course great coffee!

Awaken Coffee, 125 W Jackson Ave, Knoxville, TN 37902. Open daily. Information: 865-951-0427, www.instagram.com/awaken_coffee or www.facebook.com/awakencoffeeoldcity/

RED Gallery is proud to announce the opening of if only in my dreams … by Melissa N. Everett

A collection of quilts, sculptural pieces, soft mixed with rigid, color used to nurture and encourage you to "be a wildflower”.

"As a mother, I wish I could provide solace and refuge for you all. Instead, we must connect to our inner children and play in our communities. Let’s escape to our dreams—find comfort in our imaginations. As a female artist, woman, and caregiver in a society that undervalues my contributions, this is my expression of hope. These artworks are pieces of pretend worlds I create to escape, to connect to my younger self. When the roles of domesticity seem to dominate my daily life, I visit these worlds to remind myself of all my layers.”

The show will open on First Friday, December 6, 5 - 9pm and will run through the month of December.
RED Gallery, 131 W Jackson Avenue, Knoxville, TN 37902
robin@robineaster.com
IG: @redgallery.knox

The Arts & Culture Alliance proudly presents its 2024 Members Show, the largest annual exhibition of local artists in the Greater Knoxville area. The fresh mix of two- and three-dimensional works created within the last two years encompasses a wide variety of media such as oil, acrylic, watercolor, pastel, mixed media, photography, fine craft, sculpture, ceramics, fiber, and more from regional artists who are all individual members of the Arts & Culture Alliance, which serves and supports a diverse community of artists, arts organizations, and cultural institutions. Membership is open to all, and information may be found at www.knoxalliance.com/join-renew.

A free celebration with the artists will take place on Friday, December 6, from 5:00-9:00 PM. The 51st Annual WIVK Christmas Parade starts at 7:00 PM along Gay Street and passes in front of the Emporium.

"What a wonderful collection of thought-inducing work from some of the Arts & Culture Alliance's thousands of members," says Liza Zenni, Executive Director of the Arts & Culture Alliance. "As Greater Knoxville's only Local Arts Agency and United Fund, we couldn't be prouder to support and serve this dynamic community of artists."

Individual members of the Alliance participate locally and regionally in gallery exhibitions, art festivals, sculpture trails, weekend shows, studio tours, and public murals. Some Alliance members are full-time artists, while others have day jobs and create on evenings and weekends. Some members include art professors with the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, Carson-Newman University, Maryville College, Pellissippi State, Roane State, and Walters State. Others are teachers within Knox and surrounding counties’ elementary, middle and high schools. Some Alliance members teach classes privately or through community classes with the Appalachian Arts Craft Center, Arrowmont School of Arts & Crafts, Fountain City Art Center, Knoxville Arts & Fine Crafts Center, Knoxville Museum of Art, Mighty Mud, and Oak Ridge Art Center. Many of the artists have working studios in their own homes, while some are part of studio collectives such as Broadway Studios & Gallery, The Emporium, Mighty Mud, Relay Ridge, Sunday Studios, and West Fifth Studios.

The 2024 Members Show will be on display throughout the Emporium Center, 100 S. Gay Street, in downtown Knoxville from December 6-21, 2024. Most of the works will be for sale and may be purchased through the close of the exhibition by visiting in person or via the online shop at www.knoxalliance.store. The Emporium is open to the public Monday-Friday, 9:00 AM - 5:00 PM and Saturday, 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM. Please note, the Emporium will be closed December 22-29 for the holidays. For more information, please see www.knoxalliance.com or call (865) 523-7543.