By Robert Felker
March 6–27, 2026 @ Arts & Culture Alliance
The Arts and Culture Alliance, Knoxville, Tennessee, announces its March exhibits.
E Pluribus UnumJuried Exhibitionin the Lower Gallery
The Arts & Culture Alliance latest juried exhibition entitledE Pluribus Unum(“Out of many, one”) invited artists to reflect on American life and our shared history through contemporary art. This project, funded by the Tennessee Arts Commission, encourages creative reflection on American ideals and our national narrative; by bringing local artists and audiences together around shared creative expression, the project highlights Knoxville’s role as a vibrant contributor to the national conversation on the country’s past, presentand future. The exhibition encompasses all styles and genres from both emerging and established artists. Cash awards totaling $500 are announced at a brief awards ceremony at 5:30 p.m., March 6.
Artist exhibited include Kerry Osborne, Helen J Kerr, Donna Hart, Linda Blair, Yvonne Dalschen, James A Anderson, Staley Pearl, Andreas Koschan, Bethany Stahl, Natalie McLaurin, Billy J Bailey, Haley Myers, Michelle Gilliam, Stephen Simmerman, Michele Croslin, Jared Gottschall, Daniel Adame, Christine Barron, Manderley Swain, Christina Damron, Anna Rykaczewska, Liz Lee, Lisa Weaver, Dan Podsobinski, Robert H Thompson, Carmen Alcocer, Cheri Jorgenson, Rene Oberer, David Underwood, Michael Murphy, Renee Branum, Betty Bullen, Theo Mullen, Robert Grassel, Valerie Spiva, Sylvia Milanez, Sara Wieland, Greg Lach, Damjana Mraovic-O'Hare, Bonnie Stoliff and Karina Jacks
About the juror:Josiah Golsonis an artist, the creator of800 Collective, and the Restorative Arts Manager with Metro Arts Nashville in Nashville, Tennessee. Golson received his B.A. in communication from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and his law degree from the University of Texas School of Law in Austin. Through multiple mediums including collage, poetryand video, Golson creates personally driven narratives as invitations for collective storytelling. Developing his artistic practice while studying law, Golson expanded his projects from individual works to collaborative workshops and projects inspired by civic themes. While practicing law, he founded the 800 Collective to creatively inspire and organize civic discourse and engagement. Golson has taught and facilitated workshops at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, the Curb Center at Vanderbilt University, and Project Row Houses in the Third Ward of Houston, Texas. Golson has also curated exhibits at Stove Works in Chattanooga, Tennesseeand the Atlanta Contemporary in Atlanta, Georgia.
Traditional Stained Glass with a Modern Twistin the Display Case
Laura Goff Parham presents a variety of stained glass works that approach the discipline with an experimental flair, imbuing the pieces with a sense of play. Both flat and sculptural, Parham's works invite the viewer to explore color, formand texture and consider the expansive possibilities of glass through a contemporary lens.
Parham is a professional stained glass artist based in Knoxville, Tennessee. She received her BA in art history with a minor in English from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, in 1986. During her senior year, she backpacked through Europe for six months, where she fell in love with stained glass. Working by commissions only, she has created stained glass works throughout the Southeast for the past 40 years. She has designed and fabricated numerouslarge-scale projects for churches, businessesand private residences. Her usual medium is traditional stained glass, leaded glass, beveled glass, sandblastedand painted glass. Lately, she has branched into fused glass, which she calls her playtime. The fused glass uses the traditional glass of stained-glass windows however they are melted together in a kiln to form small plates and platters and pieces of art. While she works through the medium of glass, her process is reminiscent of oil painting, watercolor, collageand printmaking as she crafts her vibrant works.
Stained Glass Windows | Lauragoffdesigns.com | Knoxville| Instagram @lauragoffdesigns | Facebook:www.facebook.com/lauragoffparham
Soft Wounds, Loud Colors: Fragments of a Lived Experienceon the North Wall
Soft Wounds, Loud Colorsgathers a series of digital works that reflect how Liz Leesees and feels experience through pattern, memoryand sensation. These pieces are not stories with beginnings and endings – they are fragments of perception held in color, shapeand form. Some moments are intense, some are quiet; each exists as a space to enter rather than a point to explain. The work invites you to slow down and feel – to notice how color can carry emotion, how structure can hold thought, and how movement through form becomes a way of sensing rather than understanding. You don’t have to decode these images but rather just inhabit them.
Lee is a multidisciplinary artist based in Knoxville, Tennessee. Her digital work, shaped by lived experience and intuition, explores perception and sensation through pattern, repetitionand bold color, creating spaces to enter rather than stories to interpret.
Patron Saints of Rock, Revivalin the Atrium
After a five-year hiatus, Patron Saints of Rockreturns to the Emporium Center for a soul-stirring revival. It is a continuation of (and a return to) the larger-than-life portrait series Robert Felker has been creating of music’s iconic personalities since 2019.
Robert Felker was born in Knoxville and grew up in Nashville. He has a BFA in Media Arts from the School of Visual Arts, NYC where he studied painting and illustration. After several years as a freelance illustrator, he transitioned to graphic design for more than 25 years while continuing to paint and make collages. Patron Saints of Rockbegan as a labor of love and debuted at the Bijou Theatre in 2019, then again in 2021 at the Emporium Center. He also paints land/cityscapesen plein airand in studio and has completed several public art projects: the Cormac McCarthy Firefly Mural on Clinch Avenue; the Bijou Theatre’s 111th Anniversary Commemorative Mural; and East Tennessee Sunrise, a collaboration with R.B. Morris, inspired by the poetry of President Jimmy Carter and located at the Knoxville Habitat for Humanity headquarters on Washington Avenue.
www.robertfelker.com|www.patronsaintsofrock.com| Instagram @robertfelker_art | Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/robert.felker.12
time. place.in the Balcony
time. place.examines how geographic and temporal contexts shape artistic practice, how creative relationships influence the ways we work, and how shared consciousness emerges within artistic communities. The exhibition considers how artists are formed not only by where and when they work, but by the people who surround, challengeand support them.
time. place.features artists who are all Tennessee-based, Tennessee-born, or deeply influenced by this region with strong ties to Knoxville and Nashville. Curated by Ashley Layendecker, each featured artist has had a personal impact on her journey as an artist and curator working within these communities. The proverb “iron sharpens iron” serves as a guiding framework for this exhibition: when two pieces of iron are rubbed together, both are refined and sharpened, and the saying speaks to mutually beneficial relationships grounded in accountability, encouragementand constructive feedback.
Featured artists respond to a prompt addressing the significance of time and place within their practice as well as the work presented. These reflections are shared throughout the exhibition’s run and discussed further during an artist panel on the closing weekend during Big Ears Festival (date and time forthcoming).
Artists exhibited includeAsafe Pereira, Benjy Russell, Brandon Donahue-Shipp, Brianna Bass, Daniel Bruce Hughes, Eric Cagley, Jesse Hale, Josh Bienko, Joshua Shorey, Katarina Riesing, Kayla Rumpp, Lynne Marinelli Ghenov, Megan White, Nathan Sulfaro, Rubens Ghenovand Thomas Wharton
time. place.is on exhibition throughMarch 29.
Layendecker (B. 1993) is an independent curator and the Director at Red Arrow Gallery in Nashville. A former practicing artist, she discovered her passion for curating shortly after receiving her BFA from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 2016.
For the past few years, Lauren Farkas has mapped Knoxville’s First Friday Art Walk—visualizing where artwork is being shown and sharing the details that make these exhibitions more accessible to the community. The maps, which could be drawing, print, wearable, ephemeral, installationor more serve as both a guide and a gesture—an invitation to engage, connectand take part in a creative culture that thrives on curiosity.
Farkas’ making practice follows processes of witnessing, mappingand identifying to relate to and understand the internal logic of botanical lives, spatial relationshipsand the stories of often taken-for-granted materials. She loves living in Knoxville where she completed her BFA in Painting and Drawing and MA in Art Education at The University of Tennessee. She is currently teaching art at L&N STEM Academy.
https://knoxvilleartmaps.substack.com/
The gallery is open Monday through Friday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. andSaturday 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Category: Exhibits