Support local businesses, independent artists and crafters, and just plain have a good time this Saturday, Dec. 12, at the second annual East-West Asheville Holiday Art Walk — which teams up with the inaugural Shop West Asheville event, a day of sales and discounts that includes some 50 businesses and artists. Simone Wilson’s marionettes — […]
The pale industrial walls of the Flood Gallery never looked better than they do backing Virginia Derryberry's Eide/Eidola, a collection of large paintings with a sun-bleached palette, a monumental style and a subject matter of idiosyncratically reinterpreted mythology. "Seven Deadly Sins," oil on canvas, 2009. The title derives from both Plato and Alchemy, the Idea […]
Singer-songwriter Jack Herranen's music is an inspiring exploration of working-class struggles from Tennessee's southern Appalachia to Bolivia's Andes Mountains. A native of Knoxville, Herranen now lives and works with his wife (a Bolivian native), and their two children in Tortokawa, Bolivia, a rural farming village at the outskirts of Cochabamba. On Friday, Downtown Books and […]
The big news in North Carolina insider politics these days is the resignation of state Sen. Tony Rand — and his replacement as majority leader by Sen. Martin Nesbitt of Asheville. Political insiders in Raleigh are asking one another why Rand would trade one of the most powerful positions in state government to chair the […]
Seat belts, guns, inspections, taxes, picking flowers, picking up rocks or choosing whom we want to represent us — we North Carolinians find ourselves in the precarious situation of being managed. Real liberty is a person's right to choose but, more and more, the door of choice is being swindled right from beneath our fingertips […]
In December, the woods can be dark and bare. Leaves are sparse and wildflowers long gone, but with the rain we've had this year, the all-season waterfalls in DuPont State Forest are flowing spectacularly. Lingering green at Lake Julia: Nestled in the Dupont State Forest, Lake Julia was once part of a corporate retreat. Now […]
As a member of the City of Asheville Transit Commission, I wanted to clarify some of the information presented in David Hall's letter in the Nov. 18 issue of Mountain Xpress. At this time, the city is still working on the implementation plan for the recently approved Transit Master Plan. The changes that Mr. Hall […]
Thanks for your recent special section on sustainability [Nov. 18 Xpress]. I appreciated all of the suggestions about how to be green. However, I'm disappointed that you decided to omit any information about the human activity that is the largest contributor to global warming — raising animals for food. It's time to stop ignoring the […]
Al Gore recently told ABC news "the growing meat intensity of diets around the world is one of the issues connected to this global crisis — not only because of the CO2 involved, but also because of the water consumed in the process." This "inconvenient truth" was omitted from his movie, even though "The Official […]
The writer of the letter "Vegetarians are Too Pushy about their Lifestyle" [Nov. 4] stated that most of the vegetarians he knows are "excessively pale and overweight." He needs to widen his circle and get out more. Science tells us that, on average, vegetarians weigh 3 to 20 percent less than meat-eaters. Vegetarians also experience […]
I agree with Scott Smith [Nov. 4 Letters] that the frequency of pro-vegetarian diet letters can be annoying, but I also found both Mark Noble's and Mark Strazzer's replies [Nov. 18 Letters] to contain solid points and to be well thought out and well written. I do have to counter one of Mr. Strazzer's points: […]
This letter is addressed to the Republican senators and congressmen who are all fortunate enough to have wonderful health care provided to them by the government — but are opposed to the new proposals that would insure millions who are not as lucky as they, prevent insurance companies from using preexisting conditions to turn people […]
"Go Christmas, go Hanukkah, go Kwanzaa, go Solstice!" So shout the brightly clad young models of a current TV commercial, as they leap about the screen like cheerleaders in their stripy sweaters and knitted gloves. Yet another seasonal advertisement by a multinational garment-selling conglomerate. But wait. What are the holidays mentioned in the ad again? […]
• Holiday gift guide
• Fer It or Agin’ It?
• Losing faith
We couldn’t publish the full interview with Americana guitarist/producer/songwriter/singer Dave Rawlings—it would’ve consumed the entire A&E section. Thank goodness for the Internet. Here’s the whole thing, which author Brian McGee promises is “chock full of nerdy Dave Rawlings info.”
From the Big Pink campfire sing-a-long of "Ruby" to the sheer solitude of "I Hear Them All," the Dave Rawlings Machine takes you from Harlem to the San Francisco Bay with an album that could only be made by traversing the highways and rooftops of America. Going big: Dave Rawlings has long sung harmony with […]
Emily Crabtree has splayed out her memories through visually abstract explorations of mark-making and paper-cutting for a contemplative exhibition called Fibers of Recollection. In its entirety, the show demonstrates Crabtree's varied skills: drawing, painting and mixed media sculpture. Creating the pieces over a period of months, allowed Crabtree to let the work evolve itself, rather […]
It's Fall, a transitional time for the junker. As the salad days of yard sales, warm flea market mornings and spring cleanouts lead into the hoarding, barren days of winter, the junker can go through weeks at a time without a decent "score," which leads to withdrawal, the jitters, anxiety. Which is just my schmaltzy […]
Within basic political reality, I couldn't be happier with the local election results and feel that if predictions hold up, Asheville/Buncombe has real cause to celebrate, for once, the wisdom of our voters. I actually erred in my endorsements of Bothwell and Smith, when shortly after I wrote, Manheimer showed up to Blue Ridge Pride […]
While Western North Carolina may be a tourist destination — as well as home to quite a few transplants who now enjoy our mountains, woods and lakes — there are still a few of us with longer histories here who recall a different era. Here's what I remember: Fontana Lake in 1975. I was 15 […]
Overcoming rain and interstate blockages, two teenagers' testimony supplemented that of 10 from WNC at the Department of Energy's Nov. 17 hearing in Oak Ridge, Tenn. The 12 opposed our government's proposed new $3.5 billion H-bomb factory. Despite Obama's avowal to phase out nuclear weapons, our militarists endorse a sustained global arms race for another […]
