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.

Let art turn your child’s holiday into an adventure to remember! Students in grades 1–4 are invited to join our educators for one or both afternoons of art-filled fun. Students spend their time in the Museum’s Education Center creating art of all kinds.

Please note:

• Space is limited to small groups; pre-registration is required.

Pre-registration required. FREE for the 2021-2022 school year
August 23, 2021-June 3, 2022 | Monday-Friday | 2:45-6pm
K-6th graders.
Does your child enjoy having fun and making new friends? Offering
arts, crafts, special events, homework assistance and more!
Families currently enrolled in the school system’s reduced or free
meal program, please contact your recreation center for discount
fee information.
Locations: Burton, Grant, Montford, Shiloh, Stephens-Lee

Montford Pre-Teen Afterschool Program
Pre-registration required. FREE for the 2021-2022 school year
August 23, 2021 – June 3, 2022 | Monday-Friday | 3:30-6pm
5th-6th graders.
New program designed to meet the needs of your pre-teen.
Providing time dedicated to school assignments, life skills, arts,
communication, leadership, fitness, nutrition, and loads of fun.
Location: Montford

Teen Leadership Program
Pre-registration required. FREE for the 2021-2022 school year
August 23, 2021-June 3, 2022 | Monday-Friday | 3:30-6pm
6th-9th graders.
Looking for a cool and enriching alternative for your Teen to attend
this school year? We offer creative activities, diverse projects,
field trips, and more.
Locations: Grant, Shiloh, Stephens-Lee

Join us EVERY Wednesday night for Kid’s Night! Children receive a free four-count kid’s meal with the purchase of an adult meal. See you on Wednesdays!

Dust off your thinking caps, grab your friends, and join us for Trivia Night at the taproom every Wednesday at 6pm!

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.

Featuring performances from:

The Sly Grog’s own MIKE ANDERSEN

CHARLI JASPER

FRANCES ELIZA

BUSY WEATHER

DEVYN MARZUOLA (spinning vinyl)

…and more TBA soon!!

In an ever-expanding body of work, Jens Kruger (banjo, vocals), Uwe Kruger (guitar, lead vocals), and Joel Landsberg (bass, vocals) personify the spirit of exploration and innovation that forms the core of the American musical tradition.

Originally from Switzerland, brothers Uwe and Jens Kruger began playing North American folk music at an early age and were particularly inspired by recordings of Doc Watson, Flatt and Scruggs, Bill Monroe, and other progenitors of country, bluegrass and folk music. Their first public performances were as a duo, busking on the streets of cities throughout eastern and Western Europe. After gaining a recording contract as well as a radio show on SRG SSR, the Swiss public broadcaster, they teamed up with bass player Joel Landsberg, inaugurating a trio that has been playing professionally together since 1995. Landsberg is an American citizen from New York, NY. The first re- cording project to include Landsberg was Behind the Barn, Vol. 2, released in 1997. The Kruger Brothers moved to the United States in 2002, and are based in Wilkesboro, NC.

Reserved Seat Tickets are available with Dinner reservations – You must call the venue at 828-575-2737 to make dinner reservations and secure those tickets.

General Admission Tickets are available for the main stage balcony only. Seating in the balcony is first come, first serve. Dinner service is NOT currently being offered for general admission tickets.; drink service is available at the downstairs bar on the main floor.

You must call the venue at 828-575-2737 for Reserve Seat Tickets and to make dinner reservations.

Proof of Vaccination or Negative Covid Test w/i 48 Hours :: Masks are Required