The Asheville Art Museum, one of nine North Carolina nonprofits selected to receive funding from Parsec Financial, recently announced they were awarded a Parsec Prize in the amount of $20,000. The money will support the museum’s opening exhibit, “Appalachia Now! An Interdisciplinary Survey of Contemporary Art in Southern Appalachia,” in their newly renovated downtown space.
The show expresses a many-layered snapshot of the art of our time, ultimately as a collective survey of contemporary Southern Appalachian culture. Participating artists explore traditional and present-day perspectives in contemporary artistic representations of life in the Western North Carolina region. They also look at the regional and national dialogue, spanning through time and socioeconomic status.
In this context, Asheville is the center of creativity surrounded by its artistic neighboring states Georgia, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. To gather the survey of works from emerging and established artists in the region, Jason Andrew, a curator and juror of national renown, traveled with his curational assistant Lola Clairmont to more than 54 regional studios.
For updates on the museum’s reopening, see ashevilleart.org.
