Noir Collective AVL located in the historic Black business district, referred to as The Block, is a Black-owned boutique shop and art gallery featuring Black entrepreneurs. Noir Collective AVL is a community network of wellness warriors, creative activists, and social justice visionaries, cultural keepers and peace makers. We believe that in order to achieve collective liberation, our community needs to focus on opening greater opportunities for access, especially economically, that has been historically denied to African Americans and other people of color. Noir Collective AVL supports Black Liberation through Arts, Culture, and Kinship by featuring the wares of local and regional artists, designers and craftspeople. Our mission is simple, Bringing Black back to the Block.

Entrepreneurs will have products and information on hand:

Jewelry. Original Art. Tea. Shea Butter. Prints. Black Soap. Cards. Books.

& Featured services:

Realty. Exercise & Fitness. Landscaping. Catering. Heritage Tours and more.

We have open spots for Makers and Creatives!

Robert Rauschenberg, John from the Ruminations series, 1999, photogravure on paper, edition 3/46, publisher: Universal Limited Art Editions, Bay Shore, NY, 29 ½ × 38 7/8 inches. Asheville Art Museum. © Robert Rauschenberg Foundation / VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Ruminations on Memory contends with the act of remembrance and reflection, featuring a rare presentation of all nine prints from Robert Rauschenberg’s Ruminations portfolio, Judy Chicago’s Retrospective in a Box portfolio, and selections from the Museum’s Collection. Organized by the Asheville Art Museum and curated by Hilary Schroeder, assistant curator, this exhibition will be on view in Appleby Foundation Exhibition Hall at the Museum from November 19, 2021 through March 14, 2022 in conjunction with A Living Language: Cherokee Syllabary and Contemporary Art. 

Artworks are vessels for processing, recalling, and reflecting on the past. Artists often draw upon materials from their own pasts and grasp at fleeting moments in time in the creation of an object. For the viewer, observation of an artwork can draw out personal memories.

Artworks in a variety of media explore various ways of remembering, including individual memories that focus on the moments from an artist’s past; generational memory that looks back to one’s ancestors, whether recent or long past; and collective memory, wherein in an image might evoke bygone times that balance between constructed and real. Through these artworks that ruminate upon the past, viewers may discover the stirrings of their own thoughts and recollections prompted by the works before them.

Ruminations on Memory offers a unique opportunity to experience the entirety of a major print portfolio by American painter Robert Rauschenberg (Port Arthur, TX 1925–2008 Captiva, FL). Rauschenberg was a student at Black Mountain College in NC for the 1948–1949 and 1951–1952 academic sessions and for the 1951 and 1952 summers. His Ruminations series consists of nine color photogravures which were printed in 1999 and reflect on Rauschenberg’s early life, his friends and family, and the memories he held dear. The series represents especially significant mature work by Rauschenberg that looks back to his most formative moments as an artist including his time at Black Mountain College and the friendships and ideas formed there.

Also presented in the exhibition is an important series of prints by Judy Chicago (born Chicago, IL 1939). Five decades into her career, Chicago stands as one of the foremost artists of the 20th and 21st centuries, having committed to socially minded work, uplifting in particular experiences salient to her feminine and Jewish identities. Retrospective in a Box consists of seven prints and a portfolio created in collaboration with the master printers at Landfall Press, and provides an overview of her major motifs and ideas, including the print Spring the Dinner, a nod to her seminal 1979 work The Dinner Party.

In addition to the artworks from the Museum’s Collection, visitors will be able to experience Felix Gonzales-Torres’s “Untitled” (L.A.), on loan from the Art Bridges collection. “Untitled” (L.A.) is one of the artist’s iconic interactive candy installations where memories are engaged not only through sight but through sound, touch, taste, and smell as well.

Learn more about Ruminations on Memory and A Living Language: Cherokee Syllabary and Contemporary Art at ashevilleart.org.

Artist Walter B. Stephen (Clinton, IA 1875–1961 Asheville, NC) contributed to Western North Carolina’s identity as a flourishing site for pottery production and craftsmanship in the early 20th century. Walter B. Stephen Pottery: Cameo to Crystalline features art pottery and functional vessels from each stage of Stephen’s career, from his origins discovering the medium alongside his mother Nellie C. Randall Stephen in Shelby County, TN from 1901 through 1910 to his multi-decade production just outside of Asheville. This exhibition will be on view in the Asheville Art Museum’s Debra McClinton Gallery July 28, 2021 through January 17, 2022.

In 1926, Stephen founded his third and last pottery studio, Pisgah Forest, in Arden, NC, which he operated until his death in 1961. It was at this studio that the artist perfected the “cameo” decoration technique for which he became best known. His hand-painted images, achieved with layers of white translucent clay, often feature American folk imagery, from covered wagons and livestock to cabins and spinning wheels. A selection of works from the Museum’s Collection showcase his innovation in form and in decorative surface details, including experimentation with crystalline glazing.

The Friends of the Weaverville Library (FOWL) are excited to announce the opening of their used bookstore in Weaverville on Thursday, July 8. Located in the lower level of the Weaverville Library at 41 N. Main St., the store will be open Thursdays 1-5 p.m., Fridays and Saturdays 11 a.m.-2 p.m., with expanded hours beginning in September. The store is stocked with thousands of books, audiobooks, CDs, DVDs, and more. All adult books are priced at $1.50-$3.00, children and teen books at $1.00-$1.50, audio and video at $2.00.

There is also a bargain-priced area and a collection of special finds that are priced individually. Please feel free to contact us at 828-641-1812 or [email protected]. All proceeds from the store will benefit the Weaverville Library.

The holiday shop will feature the talents of small businesses specializing in baked goods, beauty products, books, fashion and clothing, home decor, pet-friendly goods, and more. Confirmed businesses include Sea of Sweets, From the Ashes Cultural Arts, Healed Skin & Candle Co., Sweet Abode Soap, Pumpkin Dog, and Winter Magnolia Designs.

Show & Tell returns to Rabbit Rabbit in Downtown Asheville for the holiday shopping season with an outdoor winter pop up shop and market! Celebrate and shop local + indie craft, design, and vintage in a great outdoor venue.

WHEN:
Saturdays + Sundays from 12-5pm
Pop Up Shop & Market Vendors

Tuesday – Thursdays from 4-8pm
Pop Up Shop only

Be sure to check our website, facebook, and instagram for any potential closures due to weather.

WHERE:
Rabbit Rabbit
75 Coxe Ave, Asheville, NC 28801

FREE! No admission

Featuring the the best in handmade, vintage and fair trade with 50+ vendors in our curated pop up shop or the market area featuring a selection of in-person vendors. Shop vintage clothes, housewares, handmade jewelry, ceramics, apparel and more.

Grab some tacos from AVL Tacos and a brew from Asheville Pizza & Brewing while you’re there!

Visit Asheville Outlets for FREE photos with Santa by TapSnap Phototainment from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday, November 28, 2021 and Saturdays & Sundays, December 4 & 5, December 11 & 12 and December 18 & 19, 2021. Located in the center circle in front of Nike Factory Store. Visitors will receive one FREE 4” by 6” photo and digital download of a single image (while supplies last). For more information, visit ShopAshevilleOutlets.com.

FREE SANTA PHOTOS

Visit Asheville Outlets for FREE photos with Santa by TapSnap Phototainment from on Saturdays and Sundays, November 27 & 28, December 4 & 5, December 11 &12, and December 18 & 19, located in the center circle in front of Nike Factory Store.

Visitors receive one FREE  4” by 6” photo and digital download of a single image (while supplies last).

-Holiday photobooth designed by Picnic Pop-Up AVL

-Professional photos of pups & families for holiday cards by Hannah Krowka

-Dog & human charcuterie boxes by Urban Graze Co.

-Special treats from Botanical Bones

-Hot cocoa, coffee, & holiday puppuccinos

Judy Chicago, Signing the Dinner Party from the Retrospective in a Box portfolio, 2009, lithograph on paper, edition 5/50, publisher: Landfall Press, Sante Fe, NM, image: 20 × 20 inches, sheet: 24 × 24 inches. Museum purchase with funds provided by 2020 Collectors’ Circle with additional funds from Ann & Farley Snell, 2020.64.01.02. © Judy Chicago / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Drum Major Instinct is an experimental music duo from Asheville, North Carolina. Jeff Arnal plays (mostly) percussion and Curt Cloninger plays (mostly) modular synthesizer. Jeff’s drumming could be described as synco-jazz + free-world, and Curt’s modular synthesis could be described as westcoast doomgaze. But, of course, nothing is ever that straightforward. The resultant music is about waves of force, patterns within patterns (within patterns), sounds from the natural world, spiritual jazz, and running the voodoo down. An intimate performance for no more than 60 audience members.

Calling all audiophiles, foodies, music lovers, and history nerds!

Listen: https://soundcloud.com/drum-major-instinct

Curt Cloninger is an artist, musician, writer, and Associate Professor of New Media at the University of North Carolina Asheville. His art uses an array of media combinations to undermine language as a system of meaning in order to reveal it as an embodied force in the world. His art work has been featured in the New York Times and at festivals and galleries from Korea to Brazil. Exhibition and performance venues include Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), Whitney Museum of American Art (New York), Granoff Center for The Creative Arts (Brown University), Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (Chicago), Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center (Asheville), and the internet. Curt has been published on a range of topics, including new media and internet art, installation and performance art, experimental graphic design, popular music, and network culture. His fifth and most recent book is entitled, “Some Ways of Making Nothing: Apophatic Apparatuses in Contemporary Art” (Punctum Books, 2021). His essays have been published in Performance Research, Intelligent Agent, Mute, Paste, Tekka, Rhizome Digest, A List Apart, Textshop Experiments, and on ABC World News. His art, music, and writing may be accessed at lab404.com, playdamage.org, and deepyoung.org

“A balletic sense of time and imaginative deployment of colour have combined into a highly original concept” The Wire, UK

Jeff Arnal is an American percussionist, and the Executive Director of Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center. Arnal studied music at Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, MD. He received his BA in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of Maryland. During the 1990s, Arnal studied with visionary percussionist Milford Graves receiving his MFA in music from Bennington College. From 1997-2012 Arnal was active in the NYC underground music and art community. In 2000 he co-founded Improvised and Otherwise, an interdisciplinary festival for emerging artists in Brooklyn, NY. As a composer and percussionist, he has performed and collaborated with a wide range of musicians and choreographers throughout the U.S. and Europe with appearances at: Ausland (Berlin), Berlin Exploratorium, CBGBs (NYC), deSingel (Antwerp), Issue Project Room (NYC), Knitting Factory (NYC), German Nordwestradio – NDR (Bremen), Hallwalls (Buffalo NY), MATA Festival (NYC), Music Gallery (Toronto), Roulette (NYC), Tonic (NYC) and Vision Festival (NYC). His music can be heard on a number of independent record labels including Clean Feed in Portugal and Leo Records in England. His collaborations with choreographers have been produced at PS 122, Joyce SoHo, Danspace Project at St. Mark’s Church, The Chocolate Factory and Judson Church. Currently he lives in Asheville, NC with his wife, Estelle and their two boys.

Come by Saturday DECEMBER 11 @ 1:30pm for an in-store performance by Drum Major Instinct, an experimental music duo from Asheville, North Carolina. Jeff Arnal plays (mostly) percussion and Curt Cloninger plays (mostly) modular synthesizer. Jeff’s drumming could be described as synco-jazz + free-world, and Curt’s modular synthesis could be described as westcoast doomgaze. But, of course, nothing is ever that straightforward. The resultant music is about waves of force, patterns within patterns (within patterns), sounds from the natural world, spiritual jazz, and running the voodoo down.

Listen  soundcloud.com/drum-major-instinct

ABOUT THE ARTISTS:
Curt Cloninger is an artist, musician, writer, and Associate Professor of New Media at the University of North Carolina Asheville. His art uses an array of media combinations to undermine language as a system of meaning in order to reveal it as an embodied force in the world. His art work has been featured in the New York Times and at festivals and galleries from Korea to Brazil. Exhibition and performance venues include Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), Whitney Museum of American Art (New York), Granoff Center for The Creative Arts (Brown University), Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (Chicago), Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center (Asheville), and the internet. Curt has been published on a range of topics, including new media and internet art, installation and performance art, experimental graphic design, popular music, and network culture. His fifth and most recent book is entitled, “Some Ways of Making Nothing: Apophatic Apparatuses in Contemporary Art” (Punctum Books, 2021). His essays have been published in Performance Research, Intelligent Agent, Mute, Paste, Tekka, Rhizome Digest, A List Apart, Textshop Experiments, and on ABC World News. His art, music, and writing may be accessed at lab404.com, playdamage.org, and deepyoung.org

Jeff Arnal is an American percussionist, and the Executive Director of Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center. Arnal studied music at Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, MD. He received his BA in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of Maryland. During the 1990s, Arnal studied with visionary percussionist Milford Graves receiving his MFA in music from Bennington College. From 1997-2012 Arnal was active in the NYC underground music and art community. In 2000 he co-founded Improvised and Otherwise, an interdisciplinary festival for emerging artists in Brooklyn, NY. As a composer and percussionist, he has performed and collaborated with a wide range of musicians and choreographers throughout the U.S. and Europe with appearances at: Ausland (Berlin), Berlin Exploratorium, CBGBs (NYC), deSingel (Antwerp), Issue Project Room (NYC), Knitting Factory (NYC), German Nordwestradio – NDR (Bremen), Hallwalls (Buffalo NY), MATA Festival (NYC), Music Gallery (Toronto), Roulette (NYC), Tonic (NYC) and Vision Festival (NYC). His music can be heard on a number of independent record labels including Clean Feed in Portugal and Leo Records in England. His collaborations with choreographers have been produced at PS 122, Joyce SoHo, Danspace Project at St. Mark’s Church, The Chocolate Factory and Judson Church. Currently he lives in Asheville, NC with his wife, Estelle and their two boys. Hear more in this 2021 radio interview with Mike Watt (Minutemen/Firehose) on the Watt from Pedro show: www.twfps.com/past-episodes/on-air-jeff-arnal-from-asheville-nc-via-skype..

Start your new holiday tradition with LaZoom! Our top rated Hey Asheville Tour gets an extra dose of holiday cheer for the season. We’ll laugh all the way as the purple bus roams the historical streets of Asheville as you learn new holiday traditions, and meet colorful characters that are sure to bring joy to the world.

Historical and hysterical, The Hey Asheville tour features outrageously entertaining tour guides, outlandish comedy skits complete with special appearances and loads of Asheville information. You’ll get to see the best of downtown Asheville and the rarely seen but stunningly beautiful Montford neighborhood, not to mention the burgeoning River Arts District! You’ve never had a ride like this. It’s like a vaudeville show on wheels!

Find out what makes Asheville so unique on LaZoom’s City Comedy Tour. It’s the perfect mix of history, comedy, and entertainment. Our guides are trained professional actors working with an original script. It’s like a theatre on wheels! The tour highlights downtown Asheville, historic neighborhoods, the South Slope, and the River Arts District.

A Flat Rock Playhouse Christmas

This event will allow you to explore the holiday season globally.

Enjoy an evening under the stars observing the Geminids Meteor Shower at our historic, mountaintop, Internationally Certified Dark Sky Park! The Geminids meteors are often bold, white and bright. On a dark night, you can often catch 50 or more meteors per hour in a dark, moonless sky. The greatest number of meteors typically fall in the wee hours after midnight. Astronomers and telescopes will also be available earlier in the evening to view the dark skies. Registration is Required!

December 10, 11, 17, 18, and 19th.

The Winter Wonder Walk transports you inside a winter storybook where our actors bring to life the wonderful world of Winterland, and set you on a quest to find Jack Frost. Your senses will be dazzled by this completely immersive experience. After the Winter Wonder Walk Trail, a warm cozy festival tents welcomes you back to Mrs. Clause’s Kitchen with Cookies For A Clause, kids activities, a stocking stuffer market with local vendors, and concessions.
For more information, visit www.winterwonderwalk.com.

Our Memories Making Meals program will donate 4 meals to MANNA Foodbank from each ticket. Memories Making Meals is a continuation of The Haunted Trail’s BOO To Hunger program which has donated 38,400 meals in 2 years. Have a memorable family friendly night out while supporting MANNA Foodbank!

The Winter Wonder Walk is produced in collaboration with Asheville Plays!, the creators of The Haunted Trail, The Conundrum, and The Adventure Center of Asheville. We are excited to bring you another treasured part of your family’s holiday tradition.

For more information, visit www.winterwonderwalk.com.

Join Dianne Boes & Greg Candle for an evening of holiday spirit mixed with classic country, old blues, originals & duelettes…humorous & heartfelt songs…and storytelling!
The Candleers consist of Dianne Boes and Greg Candle. They love to play John Prine, Hank Williams Sr., classic country, old blues and folk, as well as their own originals. Dianne played music at her church while raising a family and working as a pharmacist. Greg taught for twenty years before spending fifteen years performing his original stories and songs on the banquet circuit. When they met they discovered they both had an affinity for roots and original music.

This concert is free and open to the public; donations are encouraged to support the musicians and sound people. Please wear a mask. Livestreamed on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/FloodGallery

Photos by Mark Kirby

Tickets must be purchased online this year. Your ticket is valid for a one-time use any night of the festival; tickets are not date-specific.

• $10 for personal vehicles (standard cars/vans)
• $25 for sprinter vans, trailblazers, and conversion vans
• $50 for buses and motorcoaches
• 20% of the proceeds benefit Special Olympics Buncombe County

Lake Julian Festival of Lights has become a tradition for many mountain families and visitors. Visitors are invited to watch the lights twinkle over the lake and listen to their favorite seasonal tunes while driving through the magical wonderland.

Lake Julian Festival of Lights takes place nightly from December 1-23 from 6 p.m.-9 p.m. Please check our Facebook page for information on closings due to winter weather.

Winter Lights returns to the gardens November 19-January 1

Tickets are now sold PER VEHICLE, not per person.

We are thrilled to announce that the 2021 Winter Lights holiday event will welcome members and guests back into the gardens as it returns to the traditional outdoor walk-through open-air show format. The famously tall 50-foot lighted tree and the Quilt Garden will be back, outfitted with new designs in lights, while throughout the gardens, popular arrangements will mingle with ones never seen before.

You can find everything you need to know about Asheville’s Brightest Holiday Tradition at the tabs above, and be sure to secure your tickets now.

We hope you will join us this holiday season!

Winter Lights is the Arboretum’s largest annual fundraiser, and supports many parts of its mission driven programming.