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This is what our beautiful building used to look like.... |
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December 2005
Board president, Dr. Jefferson Chapman, welcomes our members! The Arts & Culture Alliance welcomed about 50 of our members to our Annual Membership Meeting on December 15, including a catered lunch by Pasta Trio. Many members brought a representative piece of work to display. Executive Director Liza Zenni gave an overview of the year and spoke at length about how much money the Alliance has been able to return to artists during the past year. [updated 12/12/05]
Photos from the opening reception for Mike Berry and Victoria Lenne: Recent Works
Tracy Kramer and Victoria Lenne
Mike Berry and friends
Thank you to all who attended the opening reception on December 9! Congratulations to the artists, who sold ten pieces! The exhibit remains in the Emporium through January 6. [updated 12/12/05]
Photos from the Extravaganza
Don & JoAnn Parsley
Thank you to all who participated! More than 750 people attended the 2nd Annual Emporium Holiday Extravaganza. The following artists and organizations participated: And thank you to our performers: Thank you also to our radio sponsor, EZ88! www.ez88.org [posted 12/12/05]
Emporium Holiday Extravaganza: Downtown’s Most Affordable Holiday Shopping Event with One-of-a-Kind Selection of Gifts and Performances by Local Artists The Arts & Culture Alliance is pleased to sponsor the second annual Emporium Holiday Extravaganza on December 2 & 3: a two-day celebration of handmade gifts, live performances, and holiday cheer in downtown Knoxville! The Arts & Culture Alliance ignites Knoxville’s holiday spirit by hosting an enticing array of unique holiday gifts from thirty local artists, museums, and historical homes as well as current works by more than ten of Knoxville’s finest performing arts groups. Lighted and secure parking for $2/daily (Friday & Saturday) as well as free parking for the parade (Friday, 5-9pm). Click here to see our Knoxville News Sentinel ad.
The Alliance invites the public and downtown workers to browse the merchandise of artists on Friday, December 2, and lunch fare will be available from downtown restaurant, The Lunchbox, between 11am-2pm. Handmade gifts include: Christmas linens, brush animal ornaments, cards, wool felted purses, scarves, jewelry, silk screens, original oils, prints, wood furniture, sculptures, wall graphics, cookbooks, anthologies, stained glass panels, and gift shop items from local museums and historical homes. The Extravaganza continues until 9pm Friday evening with holiday entertainment, carolers, sweet treats, and warm drinks to entice people to come inside the Emporium building before and after the Christmas parade down Gay Street. Free parking is available at the new PBA Jackson lot (just around the corner from the Emporium) after 5pm on Friday. On Saturday, December 3, from 11am-6pm, the Emporium Center again hosts a variety of festive activities. Hear a string quartet from the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra and watch contemporary dance performances while shopping for holiday gifts that support the arts and culture community of Knoxville. The Alliance will also sell Culture Cash: cash-equivalent certificates redeemable with more than forty of Knoxville’s arts and culture organizations, including the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra, the Knoxville Opera Company, the Knoxville Zoo, Clarence Brown Theatre, and more. Culture Cash is a unique gift that supports the work of local artists and arts and cultural organizations. In July 2004, the Emporium Center opened as Knoxville’s first true arts center at 100 S. Gay Street. Built in 1898 as the original home of a prestigious furniture company, the Emporium Building housed a wholesale goods distributor and later became a textile manufacturing facility that fulfilled military contracts. The two adjacent buildings and the vacant lot were the location of the “Parthenon of Country Music,” which served as the home of the WNOX Mid-day Merry-Go-Round. The 23,000 square feet of flexible use space now houses the Emporium Center Gallery and the administrative offices of the Arts & Culture Alliance and ten other arts and cultural organizations. Additionally, the building houses studio and gallery space for twelve individual artists. The Emporium Center project was designed to attract more visitors to downtown to enjoy arts and cultural programming and conduct arts-related business. At the same time, the project provides affordable space for a critical mass of arts and culture organizations and artists, generates coordination and joint promotion of arts and culture activities, and provides another valuable attraction in a revitalized downtown. For more information please call (865) 523-7543 or visit the Alliance at the Emporium Center for Arts & Culture at 100 S. Gay Street. www.knoxalliance.com [updated 11/14/05]
Arts & Culture Alliance Presents Mike Berry and Victoria Lenne: Recent Works The Arts & Culture Alliance presents Recent Works, a new exhibition featuring the works of Mike C. Berry and Victoria Lenne. The show runs from December 9 – January 6 at the Emporium Center and encompasses two-dimensional media: oils, pastels, watercolors, acrylics, and mixed media. The Arts & Culture Alliance selected these two artists to share the Emporium Gallery for this exhibit because they are both well accomplished in their mediums; additionally, the works of Berry and Lenne are distinctive and complementary.
Artist Mike C. Berry uses sweeping brush strokes to portray the energy of life around him through layers of color and striking compositions in oils and pastels. With a technique he describes as "brushy realism", Berry strives to capture the alluring effects of light in each work, ranging from the glow of a cafe at night to the brilliance of the sun on a outcropping of trees. Berry completed a Masters in Fine Art from the Savannah College of Art & Design in Georgia. Throughout his journey as an artist, he has created many landscapes and portraits inspired by people and his travels around the world. Berry received wonderful instruction and personal encouragement from artists Michael Shane Neal, Richard Schmid, Bart Lindstrom, and expressionist painter Wolf Kahn. Currently, Berry serves as Gallery Manager for the University of Tennessee's Downtown Gallery and conducts private lessons to students interested in the art of portraiture. Berry receives numerous commissions to create portraits and landscapes for clients and is creating a defined and collective body of work to make available to collectors and galleries. He is an active member of the Portrait Society of America as well as the Arts & Culture Alliance of Greater Knoxville. He and his wife, Leah, live in Knoxville. Artist Victoria Lenne endeavors to depict her experience with life as “a constant state of change” in her artwork: childhood memories of places now destroyed by natural erosion as well as the impact of humans on this process. Fascinated by the tenacity of nature, Lenne uses numerous natural objects in her work, including snake skins, feathers, and wasp and bird nests. Lenne began her art education at Wichita State University, Kansas, and is currently pursuing her BFA at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. She has signature and juried membership in several national watercolor organizations as well as the Southern Watercolor Society and the International Society of Experimental Artists and is an active member of the Knoxville and Tennessee Watercolor Societies. Recently, collectors purchased two of her paintings at the opening reception of the Appalachian Corridor Exhibition in Charleston, WV, a regional all-media show juried by Faith Ringgold. Lenne also received notification of a second place award for her painting “Marsh Inferno”, juried into the Wyoming National Watercolor exhibition. The opening reception on Friday, December 9, from 5:30-8pm, is free and open to the public, and complimentary wine and hors d’oeuvres are served. Mike Berry and Victoria Lenne: Recent Works, is on exhibit from December 9 – January 6 at the Emporium Center for Arts & Culture, 100 S. Gay Street, downtown Knoxville. Gallery hours are Mon-Fri, 9-5pm. Please note: the Gallery will be closed December 23 – January 1. For more information, please contact the Arts & Culture Alliance, (865) 523-7543, or visit our website at www.knoxalliance.com. [updated 11/14/05]
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Visit the Alliance's Emporium Center
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