On View
Connections in the Making
Connections in the Making
Nov
17
–
Oct
31
Nov 17, 2023
–
Oct 31, 2026
Photo credit:
Rachel Meginnes, I Traverse Daily (detail), 2021; Courtesy of the Artist. Erika Diamond, 40% (detail), 2022; Photo by Echard Wheeler, Courtesy of the Artist. James Vester Miller portrait; Courtesy of Andrea Clark. Potter Matt Jones digging clay; Courtesy of the Artist. Gabe Crow, Eye of the Sacred Bird, 2020; Courtesy Center for Craft. Graphic by Drum Machine Editions.
*This exhibition will be on view through October 31, 2026.
Craft has the capacity to connect people to one another, to ground us in a specific place, and to bridge generations across time. Connections in the Making includes works by regional artists, craftspeople, and entrepreneurs that tell many different stories about ways craft connects us.
Blacksmith Rachel David hosts skill-building workshops that demonstrate how craft brings people together. Over the past six years she has hosted free forging demonstrations and workshops for predominantly BIPOC and LGBTQIA++ individuals. David makes craft approachable for a wider and more diverse group of people.
Craft can also connect us to a place. Basketmakers Gabriel Crow, Lucille Lossiah, and Ramona Lossie (Eastern Band Cherokee) use materials and dyes native to Western North Carolina to create exquisite baskets that highlight the inseparable relationship between land and the Cherokee people.
Finally, craft connects our cultural pasts to the present. Artist Rachel Meginnes sees herself as a collaborator with makers whose names were once known. She deconstructs old quits and weaves them into new compositions. “The hands and minds that made these heirlooms are gone,” Megennis explains, “my own choices respond to the material that remains and the choices of past makers that I study.”
Come discover your own ties to craft and why making matters today by exploring the eleven stories that form Connections in the Making.
Meet the artists
Faye Junaluska
Cherokee, NC
Lucille Lossiah
Ramon Lose
Cullowhee, NC
ᏯᏗ ᎺᏂ Betty Maney
Cherokee, NC
ᏗᎳᏂ Dylan Morgan
Cherokee, NC
ᎺᎵ ᏔᎻᏏᏂ Mary W. Thompson
ᏎᎳᏂ ᏔᎻᏏᏂ Sarah Thompson
Patricia Welch
Meet the artists
about the artists
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
Photo credit: Jamie Hopper
about the curator
exhibition Images
exhibition Images
Marilyn Zapf
Aram Han Sifuentes is a recipient of the Center for Craft’s 2022 Craft Research Fund Artist Fellowship. This substantial mid-career grant is awarded to two artists to support research projects that advance, expand, and support the creation of new research and knowledge through craft practice.
close
✕
UNC Asheville transforms lives through leadership and education. The designated liberal arts and sciences institution for the UNC System and one of the nation’s top 10 public liberal arts universities, UNC Asheville enrolls 3,600 students and offers more than 30 undergraduate majors and a Master of Liberal Arts and Sciences degree. UNC Asheville also encourages students to take part in a nationally acclaimed undergraduate research program and participate in interdisciplinary learning. From internships and hands-on projects, to study abroad and community engagement, students experience an education that extends beyond campus into the vibrant City of Asheville, the surrounding Blue Ridge Mountains and the world.
close
✕
A liberal arts college grounded in social responsibility, where hard work and community are more than just words.
More On View