Maggie Valley Woodcarver Saws Through the Competition
by“Mountain Mike” Ayers is a Maggie Valley-based sculptor who carves wood in extraordinary detail using a chainsaw and does it faster than almost anyone…
Wood
Here’s What Happens When You Fly Away
byWhen he was only seven, Mark Woodham got a knife from his grandfather, along with some important advice. “‘Always carve away from yourself,’” Woodham…
A Trip Down the Serpentine Path
byAlthough Susan Query has been creating art her whole life, she studied psychology as an undergrad, holds a PhD in health education, and focused…
The Only Gallery is the Back Story
byThe long reach of the COVID-19 pandemic has left few areas of life untouched — even if those areas happen to be off the…
Professional Crafts Program puts Local Talent to Work
byFour years ago, Annah Bible-Sullivan found her fate in a spoon. She was a junior at Asheville High School, looking for an elective to…
Talk to the Man Who Talks to the Trees
byMore than 1,000 years old, bonsai — the art of meticulously pruning plants, most often trees, to keep them much smaller than they would…
The Skateboard as Artistic Springboard
byAs a mainstream pastime it’s waxed and waned for many decades, but skateboarding as an obsession always re-emerges, and along with it, the singular…
Staying the Course
byMade of no less than 16 kinds of species of exotic and domestic hardwoods and comprising 1,500 hours of labor, “Ironwood” is undeniably a…
On Utility and Elevation
by“Sometimes unexpected things happen, and I have to work around it. You might come into some cracks or a hole and it’s, ‘Oh, didn’t…
The Piano, It Looks Like a Carnival
byPiano man Perry Olds isn’t a professional entertainer, but his zeal for making assemblage is rollicking enough. Olds jokes about a keyboard-player friend “who…