Work by Recipients of Bailey Opportunity Grants
August 7-28, 2020
Work by Recipients of Bailey Opportunity Grants
Opening reception: Friday, August 7, 4:00-7:00 PM
Viewing hours by appointment only, Monday-Friday, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM
The Arts & Culture Alliance presents an exhibit of painting, photography, woodwork, forged metal, jewelry, sculpture, and more by 25 of the individual artists who are recipients of an FY21 Ann and Steve Bailey Opportunity Grant. Artists in the exhibition include: Becky Chaffee, Alyssa Coffin, Bobbie Crews, Yvonne Dalschen, Terina Gillette, Jessica Gregory, Lila Holdenried, Alex Jaynes, Shannon Johnson, Jeanne Kidd, David Luttrell, Elysia Mann, Ryan Mason, Renee Mathies, Tom Owens, Kerry Remp, Annie Rochelle, Nancy Rowland Engle, AngelaDawn Russell, Ericka Ryba, Roberta Smashey, Emily Taylor, Houston Vandergriff, Brandon Woods, Rodney Yardley, and Conny Zhao.
A part of the Arts & Heritage Fund, the Bailey Opportunity Grants provide financial and technical support to individual artists and small, professionally-oriented arts and culture organizations. The grants are designed to spur continued artistic and administrative growth in innovative, entrepreneurial artists and organizations at any stage in their development. Throughout the next eleven months, the 34 individual artists will utilize their collective $80,300+ for local, regional, and national workshops, studio time, technical equipment, and more.
About the artists:
Becky Chaffee
“Perfect for Covid Times”, Becky has recently compiled her “music lesson” art to publish a book, “Have Fun with Your Music” for music students emphasizing having fun and good practice habits. Her new art pieces are for her 2nd music lesson book, to be titled “Passion for Practice, a Mindful Music Odyssey” which will include more complex practice ideas with a collection of fun practicing stories from musicians. Becky’s work is a fusion of fun and education. She likes the idea of inspiring children. To accomplish this, she uses brightly colored folk art sprinkled with humor in both illustrations and captions. Sometimes she gets side-tracked with purely humor. Because she loves requests, her subject matter has expanded from the large music collection to science and reading concepts, community, cats and dogs, wild animals, yoga, beer, weddings and holidays. Her art is mainly created with acrylics on canvas, though she enjoys incorporating mixed media. Her large collection of Music lesson art (cards and prints) come from listening to her children’s classical and jazz violin and piano lessons for many years, then her own flute lessons after her children left for college. (Both her kids, now young adults, currently practice their instruments for their own pleasure.) Prior to painting, Becky created fabric music purses in the shape of musical instruments, calling her little violin purse, a “Violette”; then adding grand piano, guitar and ukulele purses. Thru her company, MusicTeacherGifts.com (aka Violettes by Becky), Becky raises funds for music education causes. Becky holds an Annual Youth Composition Competition for ages 10 thru 18 and has distributed $1,000s in funds and prizes to youth. She will soon be accepting entires for her 8th annual competition. Becky’s work is sold in the Nashville Symphony, Brevard Music Center and San Francisco Symphony Gift Shops, Legends Gift Store in Nashville, The Maltz Jewish Heritage Museum Gift Shop in Ohio, The Knoxville Visitor Center, Knoxville Soap and Candle and music stores across the country.
www.MusicTeacherGifts.com
https://www.facebook.com/MusicTeacherGifts
Instagram @music_teacher_gifts
Alyssa Coffin
Alyssa Coffin is an interdisciplinary artist from New England. She graduated from Montserrat College of Art in Beverly, Massachusetts, with studies in visual art as well as creative writing. She has traveled widely, including a formative period in Ireland, focusing on environmental interventions and performances. She was recently artist in residence at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Her recent book, Remergence, juxtaposes poetic reflections with her artwork as an exploration of death and creation. She currently resides in Knoxville, TN and has an exhibition on view at Gallery 1010.
Her artwork is a sensory engagement with material reality. She sources the natural environment for material to transform through playful discovery. Her work explores the dialogue between the internal landscape and the external landscape. Across the iterations of her process, from vulnerable performative interactions, to photo skins and installations, she sculpts an understanding of what it means to be human as mind, body and spirit in relationship with the natural world.
www.alyssacoffinart.com
Instagram: @coffinalyssart
Bobbie Crews
I love to paint people. A variety of artists have influenced my work from Artemisia Gentileschi to John Singer Sargent, Vincent Van Gogh, Mary Cassatt, Andrew Wyeth, Norman Rockwell and Lucian Freud. I love all things Art Deco and Art Nouveau. I paint cars as though they were portraits of people and often take a break to do something entirely unexpected. As a child my artwork began by doing a lot of self-portraits and drawing anyone who would hold still. A Van Gogh exhibition at the Toledo Museum of Art was a major influence. I learned about the power of observation and the value of capturing what I saw. Oil paint is my current favorite medium and I layer it to create the luminosity of life.
www.bobbiecrews.com
https://www.facebook.com/Bobbie-Crews-Studio-219438364814274/
Yvonne Dalschen
Yvonne Dalschen is an event and art photographer in Oak Ridge, TN. She started out as a book person, but was kicked off her path and developed a serious interest in photography, switching from words to visual forms of communication. She is a collector of images, the camera is a gathering tool, the phone becomes a hold-all of images. She is fascinated by the possibilities of modern photography technology, capturing moments and perspectives impossible to catch just years ago. She also works with style transfers and layering techniques in Photoshop and other editing software. Yvonne is involved in a number of art groups, the Arts & Culture Alliance Knoxville, A1LabArts, PPETN, Camera Club of Oak Ridge, Oak Ridge Art Center, and most recently the Six Feet Project. Her work has been selected for and won awards in juried shows across the US, and she has been a juror for local exhibitions.
Website: www.yvonnedalschen.com
Smugmug: yphoto.smugmug.com
Email: yvonnedalschen@gmail.com
Terina Gillette
Terina Gillette is a self-taught artist that resides in Knoxville, Tennessee. Her art studio is nestled in the historic Dogwood Trails area of Holston Hills. Terina is a mixed media artist and is diverse in her artistic expression. She enjoys the tactile process of creativity, and works in a wide array of mediums from pastels, to acrylics, to oils. Her subjects range from colorful, texturized abstracts, to whimsical and fun art, to detailed florals and local landmark paintings. Her work is collected by private individuals and businesses in the East Tennessee region. Terina’s formal education is in psychology, and she is currently researching the positive power of color and texture to visual perception. Whimsical and unique subject matters that evoke feelings of happiness and fun are often areas that she gravitates towards. She feels that painting these types of paintings can encourage the viewer to connect to a moment in time that resonates with simplistic positivity.
“I believe that art is an expressive way to heal, and that color is an essential part of our daily lives and our being. For this reason, I have worked to create a collection of art that combines my love for psychology and color to evoke feelings of happiness. People deserve to connect to peacefulness, and art can facilitate that feeling. It is my hope that each piece of art that I create connects the viewer to a happy place or time in their lives; so, my slogan is creating art that takes you to your happy place!”
https://www.instagram.com/terinagillettefinearts/
www.facebook.com/terinagillettefinearts
https://www.terinagillettefinearts.com
Jessica Gregory
My artwork may have an element of whimsy juxtaposed by something more serious to contemplate. I hope to provoke thoughts of our natural environment and the human condition through these compositions. I work in oils, acrylics, pastels, watercolor and mixed media. Some of my sculptural works use recycled and up cycled materials as armatures which are then covered with homemade paper mache clay. I also work with wood, metal and clay.
https://www.facebook.com/pg/RightHemisphereArt
Lila Holdenried
In reflecting back to five years ago as I held a paintbrush for the first time as an artist, I learned the nature and intent of my art as I pushed color onto canvas. I feel the urge to express the feeling of hope beyond distress, light visible amidst darkness, revealing a calm within confusion. Through my art, I explore objects and emotions and express through painting how they might appear if they were excavated or exposed to the natural elements. My intention is to show the viewer and myself as well the there is always a gift to be discovered if we dig deep enough and remain true to ourselves.
My professional studies and research in painting lies in dozens of art history books, collected from my mother over the years who was a college Art History professor. Through my studies in Studio Art, abstract art chose me, allowing me to stay open and explore possibilities.
Alex Jaynes
A. Jaynes Woodworks
alexjaynes.com
Instagram @ajayneswoodworks
Shannon Deana Johnson
My current work is inspired by nature and the sense of calm, peace and wonder that I experience when I focus my attention and observe nature. I try to portray that in my work. My tea bag drawings began when I noticed the organic marks left as the tea dried on the teabag paper. When I took the teabag apart, I found a very delicate paper that resembles dried flower petals and I decided to try drawing and painting flowers on it. Small tears occur when the teabag is taken apart and it reminds me of tears and holes in leaves and the beautiful “imperfections” found in nature.
www.shannondeanajohnson.com
Instagram: @shannondeanajohnson
Facebook: Shannon Deana Johnson Art
Jeanne Kidd
With an abiding love for stone sculpting, my heartfelt passion has always been creating three-dimensional art. Rarely working from specific imagery, I get an image, concept or sensation, and simply draw a general idea directly onto a stone and begin chipping away. My work is abstract, but reminiscent of things that are familiar.
The last two years I have been creating sculptural work also in bronze. Another three-dimensional process I have fallen deeply in love with. Working with bronze is a mysteriously satisfying and magical process of transformation that stirs my soul, excites my imagination and offers a sense of endless possibility. No matter which medium I work in, the creation process involves complete immersion and interaction with the material. I’m continually exploring how does the piece feel, what colors are emerging and what sensations are being expressed. I love seeing light and shadow interact on each one and I hope the viewer is inspired to feel their own passions when they experience my art.
Ultimately, my work flows from all sides, feels good, and inspires a desire to reach out to touch. Art that feels soft, warm, and inviting from materials that are technically cold and hard is a mysteriously sensual process that thrills me and reveals itself in all my work.
www.justmeandmyart.com
Instagram: @jeanne.kidd
David Luttrell
I’ve been a photographer for over 40 years, got the bug when I was 18. Drifted into Architecture a bit in college but the smell of Dektol and Fixer was too much of an aphrodisiac. I started with the larger cameras and worked my way down to a Nikon and several lenses and then back up again. I was a TVA photographer in the 80’s and became fascinated with their archive of Lewis Hine’s negatives that he shot in the early years of the agency. I did commercial work after that. Studio, lights, sheet film, Polaroid, assistants, art directors, etc., ……been there, done that. Digital comes along and a 3 megapixel camera was big deal. So was Photoshop and everything that goes with it. You adjust and grow. And over the years I’ve had some wonderful adventures following this passion. Currently I work with digital cameras, the iPhone, old film cameras and flatbed scanners.
www.astralatelier.com
Instagram @dluttphoto
Elysia Mann
Elysia Mann grew up in the woods and prairie grass of rural Northeast Nebraska. She studied fine art at Washington University in St. Louis and received her MFA at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. She co-founded All Along Press, a collaborative print shop in St. Louis, managed Florida State University’s Small Craft Advisory Press, and briefly served as Residency Associate at the newly established Loghaven Artist Residency in Knoxville. She currently serves as the Art & Design Editor for the literary journal _Grist_. In her Knoxville studio, Elysia reflects on contemporary issues of ecological attachment, intersectionality, and binary thinking. Her interdisciplinary approach blurs the edges of print, textile, drawing, and poetry, and recent exhibitions include “Year Yellow,” a solo show at 621 Gallery in Tallahassee, FL; “Women Weavers,” at Ideobox in Miami; and the 2018 Wiregrass Biennial in Dothan, AL where she received the curator’s award for best-in-show.
I work with technologies that are slow and anti-capitalist. Having a penchant for the unruly, I experiment with innovative ways to splice together weaving, drawing, print, and poetry. A contemplative pace lets me work from both intuition and research, building metaphors that thread autobiographical fragments within the larger tapestry of shared human experience. Though I am especially interested in ecological attachment, my work is not restricted to that subject. I allow myself to wander, add, and cross-reference. The index is a central motif, documenting an array of source material—news media, literature, personal diaries, environmental observation—all shuffled out of time or sequence by way of the alphabet. I enjoy this structured disorder and its bookish absurdity. In my work, the index serves as a playful contradiction to images that are intentionally obscure and undeniably subjective. Like the archetypal trickster, my mission as an artist is to confound and entertain, to create moments of interruption from the industrialized busyness that separates us from nature and from each other. This is why slowness, complexity, and joy are woven into the moral structure of my practice. My work is an invitation to pause, enjoy the act of looking, and let nuance unfold over time.
elysiaaileenmann.com
Instagram: @elysiaallalong
Ryan G. Mason
Ryan has always found it difficult to categorize his photography as it draws from many past and present artists. From Ansel Adams to Todd Hido, Ryan seeks inspiration from the work of established masters of photography to aid him in creating new images. His love for music, and its ability to provoke a spectrum of emotional responses, often shows through in his work as he strives for the viewer to experience an individual connection when interpreting one of his photographs. Ryan’s next project, as yet unnamed, will focus on climate change and how our world may look if our present wasteful behaviors persist unchecked.
www.ryanmason.com
Instagram: @ryan.g.mason
Renee Mathies
Out of the Fire Designs / Hot Glass Jewelry Artist
Playing with fire, melting glass rods to make one of a kind, unique beads and jewelry has been my passion for over ten years. As a Bailey Grant recipient, my goal will be to learn and add silversmithing to my designs. Silver and glass make great partners! The designs will be endless. I am ready to take my glass art to new levels!
www.facebook.com/beaddreamer/
www.etsy.com/shop/outofthefiredesigns
Instagram: @beaddreamer
Tom Owens
I started shooting still images in the late 1960s with a Nikkormat FTN. For the next 50 years I worked in film and video production, equipment sales, advertising, industrial training, public relations, and higher education management; always utilizing audiovisual technology in some form. I worked at the University of Tennessee for 32 years; eighteen of those I was Director of the Video & Photography Center. While at UT, I worked with actor James Earl Jones, author Alex Hailey, Peyton Manning, Pat Summitt, and the FBI profilers featured in the film Silence of the Lambs. I traveled to Ireland, London, Costa Rica, many major US cities and every county in Tennessee. I filmed the Lady Vols at the White House Rose Garden after they won a national championship. While at UT I won many awards including from the New York Festivals, Council for the Advancement and Support of Education, and the International Television Association.
A still photograph puts a frame around a moment frozen in time. It sits still and allows and perhaps commands the viewer to look at something real. One definition of realism is a “rejection of visionary.” Yet photography done well is transcendent, “extending the limits of ordinary experience.” So, when done well it can become realism transcendent. Seeing is the essence of photography. Seeing the situation may be when all the visual elements coalesce to produce something that engages the viewer. Henri Cartier-Bresson, the French humanist photographer coined the term “the decisive moment.” In many of my photographs I’m looking for that moment. In others it’s a static situation, e.g., architecture and landscapes. In those instances, I look for strong visual elements; contrast, color, texture, reflections, and shape. My still photography is influenced by a diversity of photographers; Cartier-Bresson, Ansel Adams, Henri-Cartier Bresson, Minor White, and Diane Arbus.
www.tomowensphotography.com
Kerry Remp
Artist in Residence, Riva Ridge Studio
Annie Rochelle
Annie Rochelle is an emerging artist from Knoxville and graduate of the Maryland Institute College of Art . An intensive study abroad in Florence, Italy informs her compositions by referencing the art historical cannon of the Renaissance, Baroque and Rococo; many of her art works are an irreverent marriage between traditional forms of art making with chance based compositions. Recently, she has been interested in scientific botanical illustrations and translating the Victorian model of the ‘Language of Flowers’ into a modern and more relevant vernacular, allowing for a re-examinationed conversation between the natural and social.
Portfolio Site: aerochelle.com
Instagram: @a.e.rochelle
https://www.facebook.com/studioofaerochelle/
Nancy Rowland-Engle
My jewelry incorporates organic forms and geometric shapes in sterling silver. Most pieces have an industrial feel. My pieces come to look the way they do naturally. The textures which I incorporate through etching and fusing have, to me, come to be symbolic of decay. The shapes, the elements, and the organic forms all represent nature, as well as my sadness at our destruction of ourselves and our environment, but also the joy that comes from beautiful things.
AngelaDawn Russell
AngelaDawn is a full time professional photographer of portraits, weddings, architecture, nature, and artistic images. She also consistently works with a wide variety of East Tennessee area businesses to provide them with top quality images needed for their social media pages. AngelaDawn has had her studio in Powell since 2012 and since then has been awarded numerous accolades, awards, and blue ribbons as well as 3 Best of Show awards.
Email: info@AngelaDawnPortraits.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/angeladawnportraits/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AngelaDawnPortraits/
Ericka Ryba
Providence Road Pottery is run by Ericka Ryba, a Knoxville based potter. She earned an A.A.S. in Culinary Arts from Johnson & Wales in Charleston, SC, a B.F.A. in Studio Art and M.S. in Art Education from UT Knoxville. Ericka currently teaches art full time at Coulter Grove Intermediate School in Maryville and maintains a ceramics studio at Whimsy and a Dream in Knoxville. Her pottery is inspired from hours spent perusing antique stores combined with a fascination of food traditions. Combined with a food philosophy honed from culinary school, working on organic farms, and personal interest in nutrition, her goal is to bring families and friends together at the table for both physical and spiritual nourishment. The Providence Road aesthetic complements farmhouse decor to modern and minimalist spaces. A monochromatic, neutral color palette unifies the pottery and allows collectors to mix and match pieces for their own custom collection.
www.facebook.com/providenceroadpottery
www.instagram.com/providenceroadpottery
www.providenceroadpottery.com
Roberta Smashey
I am a stained glass artist creating both nature-themed and abstract works using the glass foiling technique developed by Louis Comfort Tiffany. By utilizing hand-made glass sheets of various colors and textures, I produce dynamic depictions of the beauty found in nature. The variations in artisanal glass give a unique feeling of depth and movement with this challenging medium. Using the Tiffany technique coupled with the beauty of glass, and a lifelong study of wildlife, I seek to evoke appreciation of our natural world in all who view my creations.
Houston Vandergriff
Houston Vandergriff’s images have been described as “colorful,” “reflective,” and “inspiring.” Through his photographs he shares his love for travel and his eye for beauty. The saying that a picture is worth a thousand words has a special meaning for Houston. Because of the low muscle tone from Down syndrome, sometimes his speech is difficult to understand. By skillfully using his camera Houston is able to share his view of the world without actually saying a word.
When Houston was born every doctor that appeared had worse news: unable to breath, jaundice, low muscle tone, hole in his heart, open heart surgery, Down syndrome. Each specialist cited their own long list of things he might never do. They never imagined by the age of 22 he would travel to all 95 counties in Tennessee, to 48 of the United States, to 6 Canadian provinces, and to 24 countries. Houston’s award-winning photography has been featured in publications, awards shows, and galleries all over the world, including SONDER and Neurobrilliant magazines, “Markings” Publishing in Pakistan, “My Perspective” in England, and the Inspiration Gallery in Scotland. Defying all the doctor’s predictions, Houston is a strong self- advocate and dedicated student behind the camera. He earned his Certificate of Photography in 2019 after completing 160 hours of study through the University of Tennessee Non-Credit and Professional Programs. He also received the Advanced Photography Certificate in June 2020.
Houston inspires others, both inside and outside of the disability community. He pushes for inclusion using the arts and creative world. By sharing his gift of photography he is also sharing the gift of hope. Houston’s life shows that disabilities don’t define the person; the person defines the ability. He expresses his passion for life in the arts. He is a globe-trotting photographer and advocate. Houston’s untarnished love for people shines easily through his Down syndrome, touching people’s hearts in ways few others could.
Instagram: @DOWNSANDTOWNS
DOWNSANDTOWNS.COM
Brandon Woods
Brandon Woods (b. 1987, Knoxville, TN, USA) creates artworks which bridge art, craft, science, and mathematics, while also conveying vibrant passions, sensitive intimacies, and rich histories unique to each viewer, through the associations they establish between the work and their individual past experiences. His artistic practice is heavily research-based and interdisciplinary: his investigations of diverse fields such as optics, computer programming, neuroscience, linguistics, and probability theory have enabled him to pursue highly innovative approaches to creating works of art in a four-dimensional arena through mathematical formulas and chance-based algorithms of his own design. Woods earned his MFA in Painting from SCAD in 2015. He has received numerous awards and grants for his work, including, most recently, a Bailey Opportunity Grant through the Knoxville Arts & Culture Alliance. His work has been exhibited and collected throughout the United States and internationally, in New York, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Miami, Hong Kong, Canada, and France. He currently lives and works in Knoxville, TN.
brandonwoodsart.com
Instagram: @brandonwoodsart
Conny Zhao
Conny Zhao is a multimedia artist and musician specializing in ethnic minority music in China and Mongolia. As a Music and Culture major at the University of Tennessee, she created The Urtyn Duu Project (urtynduuproject.com), an interactive archive that aims to give Mongolian
long-song singers a platform to showcase their traditions through videos, audio, photographs, and interview transcriptions. After obtaining her Bachelor’s degree, she spent a year in Hohhot, Inner Mongolia, China as a Fulbright scholar researching and documenting Mongolian long-song (urtyn duu). She trained as a long-song singer under Professor Qiqige at Inner Mongolia Arts University and also studied with members of the band Anda Union and long-song singer Amuguleng.
Conny’s work as a multimedia artist focuses on underrepresented peoples, how they interact with and exist within their surroundings, and how they perform their identities through various mediums. Her upcoming photography exhibition, A Place to Land, focuses on the relationships between marginalized groups and their historic and cultural ties to their land. With the support of the Bailey Opportunity Grant, she will expand The Urtyn Duu Project into a documentary that explores how long-song impacts and shapes Mongol ethnic identity in both Inner Mongolia and Mongolia. In addition, she hopes to combine her love of food and photography into a documentary style cookbook that delves into the diverse cuisines of immigrant families in the United States.
Instagram: @connyzphoto