Arts and Theatre

The North Carolina Arboretum is going wild for art and nature in 2021 with Wild Art! On view April 1 through September 26, this outdoor sculpture exhibition features works by 17 local and national artists drawing inspiration from the natural environment. Situated throughout the Arboretum’s spacious, open-air gardens, the show offers guests a doorway into the wild world from the comfort and safety of cultivated landscapes transformed by art.

The 18 sculptures on display represent a variety of approaches to the theme of “wild art,” from the literal to the abstract, and are crafted from a diverse array of materials that will delight and inspire. Let your imagination take you on a wild journey into the world of plants and animals near and far with Wild Art at The North Carolina Arboretum.

The exhibit is available to all guests during normal Arboretum hours, and there is no admission cost to view the sculptures beyond our usual parking fee of $16 per personal vehicle.

The Enveloping Landscape: A Contemplative Photographic Journey is a visual celebration of the transformative power of place-based education. In this first-ever collaboration between the Arboretum’s Exhibits and Adult Education programs, images from award-winning documentary photographer Susan Patrice join those of 22 student photographers in a breathtaking exhibit that explores the ways that we are indelibly shaped by place. Through their images, these photographers reveal not only the rich biodiversity of Southern Appalachia, but a renewed sense of kinship with their local landscapes found through photography.

What began as a documentary photography project launched by Patrice in 2016 became a collaborative Arboretum workshop led by the artist in early 2020. The project invited photographers of all levels to return each season to focus their gaze on what called to them in the landscape — deepening a contemplative practice of seeing, knowing and caring for a place. When everything abruptly changed in March of last year, this photographic community wasted no time in moving online. What seemed like an unnatural distance imposed by technology became a path into both familiar and uncharted places. This exhibition chronicles these photographers’ year-long journey, inviting viewers to step into an intimate world where the landscape is alive, waiting to be met, understood and entered.

The Enveloping Landscape: A Contemplative Photographic Journey is on display daily January 16 – May 2, 2021, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., inside the Baker Exhibit Center. Face coverings are required for visitors ages 5 years and older.

Exhibit support for The Enveloping Landscape: A Contemplative Photographic Journey is provided in part by The North Carolina Arboretum Society; Asheville Citizen-Times; RomanticAsheville.com Travel Guide; Smoky Mountain Living Magazine; The Laurel of Asheville; and Henco North Creative Imaging.

Image: Susan Patrice, Enveloping Landscape #1, archival pigment print, 45 x 45 inches, © Susan Patrice

Included with admission

A unique-to-Biltmore, large-scale outdoor sculpture will be crafted and installed in Antler Hill Village this spring by Patrick Dougherty. Over the last three decades, this internationally-acclaimed artist has combined his carpentry skills and love of nature to build over 300 of these wondrous works, captivating the hearts and imaginations of viewers worldwide.

Image: Close Ties (2006) Scottish Basketmakers Circle, Dingwall, Scotland. Photo: Fin Macrae
NOTE: This is an example of Patrick Dougherty’s work; the artist will create Biltmore’s unique structure in Antler Hill Village this spring.

The Upcountry History Museum will continue its mission of connecting young audiences with hands-on STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) learning experiences when it hosts Framed: Step Into Art.
The bilingual (English and Spanish), exhibition transforms the works of well-known painters into interactive environments. Children ages 3-12, enter the exhibit by stepping though an oversized frame and are immersed in the worlds created by well-known artists. Each work is re-created as a three-dimensional, sensory, walk-in environment that includes a print of the artist’s original work as well as important facts about the artist’s life and painting style.
Supporting the National Standards for Arts Education for K through 5th grade, the exhibit provides conversational prompts that employ visual thinking strategies. Children explore the works of four specific artists, as well as enter a Mona Lisa Gallery where they discover a print of the original painting along with famous parodies, and step behind a a cutout version replacing Mona Lisa’s face with their own.

The exhibition’s four interactive spaces include:
• Dinner for Threshers by Grant Wood explores rural life at the turn of the century inviting children to tend to the chickens and eggs, prepare a seasonal meal, set the table, and mix and match the farmers patterned shirts.
• Camp at Lake O’Hara by John Singer Sargent invites visitors to Sargent’s 1916 camp in the Canadian Rockies. Children climb inside a tent, explore camping gear like Sargent’s, prepare a meal over the campfire, and create a painting of what today’s campsite might look like.
• Corn Festival by Diego Rivera visitors travel to Mexico through this piece from the Court of Fiestas in the Ministry of Education Building in Mexico City. Children explore a rendition of one of Rivera’s frescos, add flowers and ribbons to the flower tower for a celebration and add their flourish to a miniature building mural.
• Big Chicken by Clementine O’Hara visitors meet Louisiana’s most famous female artist and folk-art icon and create imaginary animals like Hunter’s “goosters”! Children load the cart and climb behind the reins of Hunter’s giant rooster to take the load into town.

In addition to climbing inside works of art, children are invited to curate their own exhibit gallery, draw self-portraits, take part in an art/history hunt through the exhibit and create different images at a three-dimensional pattern puzzle.

Greenville nature photographer, Anthony Q. Martin, has agreed for Fountain Inn Museum to display his photography.   His photos are absolutely remarkable. 

The North Carolina Arboretum is going wild for art and nature in 2021 with Wild Art! On view April 1 through September 26, this outdoor sculpture exhibition features works by 17 local and national artists drawing inspiration from the natural environment. Situated throughout the Arboretum’s spacious, open-air gardens, the show offers guests a doorway into the wild world from the comfort and safety of cultivated landscapes transformed by art.

The 18 sculptures on display represent a variety of approaches to the theme of “wild art,” from the literal to the abstract, and are crafted from a diverse array of materials that will delight and inspire. Let your imagination take you on a wild journey into the world of plants and animals near and far with Wild Art at The North Carolina Arboretum.

The exhibit is available to all guests during normal Arboretum hours, and there is no admission cost to view the sculptures beyond our usual parking fee of $16 per personal vehicle.

The Enveloping Landscape: A Contemplative Photographic Journey is a visual celebration of the transformative power of place-based education. In this first-ever collaboration between the Arboretum’s Exhibits and Adult Education programs, images from award-winning documentary photographer Susan Patrice join those of 22 student photographers in a breathtaking exhibit that explores the ways that we are indelibly shaped by place. Through their images, these photographers reveal not only the rich biodiversity of Southern Appalachia, but a renewed sense of kinship with their local landscapes found through photography.

What began as a documentary photography project launched by Patrice in 2016 became a collaborative Arboretum workshop led by the artist in early 2020. The project invited photographers of all levels to return each season to focus their gaze on what called to them in the landscape — deepening a contemplative practice of seeing, knowing and caring for a place. When everything abruptly changed in March of last year, this photographic community wasted no time in moving online. What seemed like an unnatural distance imposed by technology became a path into both familiar and uncharted places. This exhibition chronicles these photographers’ year-long journey, inviting viewers to step into an intimate world where the landscape is alive, waiting to be met, understood and entered.

The Enveloping Landscape: A Contemplative Photographic Journey is on display daily January 16 – May 2, 2021, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., inside the Baker Exhibit Center. Face coverings are required for visitors ages 5 years and older.

Exhibit support for The Enveloping Landscape: A Contemplative Photographic Journey is provided in part by The North Carolina Arboretum Society; Asheville Citizen-Times; RomanticAsheville.com Travel Guide; Smoky Mountain Living Magazine; The Laurel of Asheville; and Henco North Creative Imaging.

Image: Susan Patrice, Enveloping Landscape #1, archival pigment print, 45 x 45 inches, © Susan Patrice

Included with admission

A unique-to-Biltmore, large-scale outdoor sculpture will be crafted and installed in Antler Hill Village this spring by Patrick Dougherty. Over the last three decades, this internationally-acclaimed artist has combined his carpentry skills and love of nature to build over 300 of these wondrous works, captivating the hearts and imaginations of viewers worldwide.

Image: Close Ties (2006) Scottish Basketmakers Circle, Dingwall, Scotland. Photo: Fin Macrae
NOTE: This is an example of Patrick Dougherty’s work; the artist will create Biltmore’s unique structure in Antler Hill Village this spring.

The Upcountry History Museum will continue its mission of connecting young audiences with hands-on STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) learning experiences when it hosts Framed: Step Into Art.
The bilingual (English and Spanish), exhibition transforms the works of well-known painters into interactive environments. Children ages 3-12, enter the exhibit by stepping though an oversized frame and are immersed in the worlds created by well-known artists. Each work is re-created as a three-dimensional, sensory, walk-in environment that includes a print of the artist’s original work as well as important facts about the artist’s life and painting style.
Supporting the National Standards for Arts Education for K through 5th grade, the exhibit provides conversational prompts that employ visual thinking strategies. Children explore the works of four specific artists, as well as enter a Mona Lisa Gallery where they discover a print of the original painting along with famous parodies, and step behind a a cutout version replacing Mona Lisa’s face with their own.

The exhibition’s four interactive spaces include:
• Dinner for Threshers by Grant Wood explores rural life at the turn of the century inviting children to tend to the chickens and eggs, prepare a seasonal meal, set the table, and mix and match the farmers patterned shirts.
• Camp at Lake O’Hara by John Singer Sargent invites visitors to Sargent’s 1916 camp in the Canadian Rockies. Children climb inside a tent, explore camping gear like Sargent’s, prepare a meal over the campfire, and create a painting of what today’s campsite might look like.
• Corn Festival by Diego Rivera visitors travel to Mexico through this piece from the Court of Fiestas in the Ministry of Education Building in Mexico City. Children explore a rendition of one of Rivera’s frescos, add flowers and ribbons to the flower tower for a celebration and add their flourish to a miniature building mural.
• Big Chicken by Clementine O’Hara visitors meet Louisiana’s most famous female artist and folk-art icon and create imaginary animals like Hunter’s “goosters”! Children load the cart and climb behind the reins of Hunter’s giant rooster to take the load into town.

In addition to climbing inside works of art, children are invited to curate their own exhibit gallery, draw self-portraits, take part in an art/history hunt through the exhibit and create different images at a three-dimensional pattern puzzle.

Greenville nature photographer, Anthony Q. Martin, has agreed for Fountain Inn Museum to display his photography.   His photos are absolutely remarkable. 

Deepen your intimacy with your surroundings and the natural world through photography. Award-winning documentary photographer Susan Patrice offers a heart-felt photography workshop that combines contemplative practices with ways to document this extraordinary time that might keep us six feet apart from other humans but can inspire a closer and more intimate focus on nature and our surroundings. Through this simple photographic practice, a nearby green space can become an oasis of beauty and connection and your own backyard can come alive with extraordinary photographic opportunities. Four Zoom-based class meetings include photographic assignments, rich sharing and discussion, and supportive critiques. Registration for this class also includes one half-hour individualized consultation with the instructor to workshop equipment, portfolio or composition questions (offered online, time to be determined).

BRN Elective credit, NC EE Criteria II or III credit

Part of Adult Education Programs offered in celebration of The Enveloping Landscape: A Contemplative Photographic Journey, showing at the Baker Exhibit Center at The North Carolina Arboretum through May 2, 2021. The exhibition brings together Susan Patrice’s photographs shown alongside participants in The Enveloping Landscape workshops in each season of 2020 at the Arboretum. This stunning and expansive exhibition shows the breadth and depth of our region through the eyes and hearts of 23 regional photographers.

Click here for additional information and educational programs and events planned in connection with the exhibition.

Tools: Zoom, Google account for sharing images

*Instructions for joining via Zoom will be sent by email the day prior to the first class. Please add [email protected] to your contacts to ensure our emails do not end up in your spam folder. This is a live, interactive class, though recordings of class sessions can be made available to registered participants by request if they need to miss a session.