Keith Bryant: The Panax Herbarium and The Monolith Assemblage

January 2-31, 2026
Keith Bryant: The Panax Herbarium and The Monolith Assemblage
Opening reception: Friday, January 2, 5:00-9:00 PM
Gallery hours: Monday-Friday, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM and Saturday (January 24 & 31), 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM with additional hours: Fri Jan 23 and Fri Jan 30, 5-7 PM for Gallery 1010 openings. Please note, the Emporium is closed on Monday, January 19, for the holiday.
The Emporium Center, 100 S. Gay Street, Knoxville, TN 37902

Drawing upon my training as a glass blower, wood worker, and bicycle mechanic, I combine skills from seemingly disparate disciplines to create multi-media sculptures out of layered wood, glass, bike parts, family heirlooms, and found objects. Through my art, I seek to make a positive environmental impact by upcycling discarded bicycle parts and other items to give them new purpose and keep them out of landfills. As an avid mountain biker, I spend a lot of time outdoors and draw inspiration from nature. Through my art, I combine my admiration for both the mechanical and natural. In my work, I blend and balance natural and fabricated elements, showing how each has function and beauty both individually and collectively.

The Panax Herbarium: A specimen collection of the varying types of Panax found in Middle Earth. It is an herb used to cure poison, bleeding and elemental effects.

The Monolith Collection: For this collection I was inspired by the idea of traveling through a fantasy, Medieval-type landscape and coming across these giant monoliths. These sculpted, boundary markers would be at the outskirts of a city honoring its most valued enterprise or signifying the beginning of a new territory. These works are how I envisioned they would look.

Keith Bryant was born near Cleveland, Ohio and began working with soft glass in high school with a focus on bowls, vases, and other vessels. In addition to taking classes at Kent State University, he received training from glass artist Earl James and other artists at the Glass Bubble Project in Cleveland. He expanded his skill set by learning lampworking to create marbles and beads. In 2004, Bryant was drawn to woodworking after members of his family began playing Native American Flutes and joined the Northeast Ohio Native American Flute Circle. Under the tutelage of Billy Crowbeak Faluski, he made handcrafted wooden flutes primarily using North American hardwoods. As he continued to refine the sound of his flutes, he also made increasingly ornate pieces, burning designs into the wood and incorporating glass inlay, sculptural wood elements, found objects, and his own Pyrex glass work. Bryant began training as a motorcycle mechanic in 2007, graduating with honors from the PowerSport Institute in Cleveland a year later. He worked for several years as a motorcycle mechanic before transitioning into working with bicycles and noticed a large amount of waste generated. He began collecting discarded bike components and other materials to see if he could incorporate them into his artwork. He combines his areas of training to create mixed-media sculpture from wood, glass, bike parts, family heirlooms, and found objects. Bryant currently resides in Knoxville and works with local bike shops and carpenters to collect waste materials for his art and keep them out of landfills. Through his artwork, he enjoys showing others how items can be upcycled and repurposed.

Instagram @kwbryantart