Ready or not, Asheville’s first film festival is here. As an early festival proponent as well as both a preliminary and a final judge, I can confirm firsthand that it’s been a long, involved process requiring many hours of work from many people. I know I wasn’t alone in often finding myself having to put … Read more
1. Steve Earle hasn’t invaded Asheville — it’ll just seem like that over the next couple of weeks. 2. On Thursday, Nov. 6, Steve Earle will appear at The Orange Peel in Asheville with the current version of his longstanding band, The Dukes — guitarist Eric “Roscoe” Ambel, bassist Kelly Looney and former dBs drummer … Read more
Photographers have traveled a long, hard road to gain respect as serious artists. Even today, when major museums and galleries are flush with photography and photo-based works, some art buyers and connoisseurs still haven’t gotten past the standard I-can-press-a-button-on-a-camera-too prejudice. But for late N.C. photographer Bayard Wootten, making pictures was hardly that easy. In the … Read more
Charles F. Price writes excellent imagery — gruesome enough, in the local author’s latest novel, to rival his characters’ own increasingly cruel lives. Blatant racism, mistreatment of animals, harsh living conditions — each section of Where the Water-Dogs Laughed: The Story of the Great Bear (High Country Publishers, 2003) festers with the ugliness of disharmony. … Read more
Of note Setting the tone for this week’s politically minded Random Acts, I’d like to report that at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 5, Eamon Martin, a member of the Asheville Global Report editorial collective, will speak at Malaprop’s Bookstore/Cafe. Martin will discuss the AGR, a nonprofit, independent, all-volunteer-staff newsweekly focusing on human rights, labor … Read more
Downtown Asheville is at a crossroads. The city’s thriving central business district is enjoying a full-blown renaissance driven by an eclectic, ever-shifting mix of boutiques, restaurants, galleries and clubs. It wasn’t always so. A mere two decades ago, downtown Asheville was home mainly to boarded-up buildings. Scarcely anyone who had other options lived downtown, and … Read more
Here’s the lowdown on a few recently opened downtown Asheville businesses: • Anntony’s Caribbean Cafe (1 Page Ave., 255-9620) is one of two restaurants of that name. The original Anntony’s, developed in tandem with a company that makes Caribbean-style sauces, is located in Charlotte. The local owners are Asheville residents Douglas Gall and Byron Greiner. … Read more
“We’re the Asheville City Council, not the Asheville City Development Council.” — Council member Holly Jones It was over in under three hours, but the decisions made at the the Asheville City Council’s Oct. 28 formal session will probably affect life in this city for years to come. Tackling three public hearings, Council members deliberated, … Read more
Fueling the learning curve The city of Knoxville will soon debut four hybrid propane/electric-powered trolleys to serve its downtown area. And within the next five years, the Tennessee city aims to replace most of its fleet of buses, trolleys and vans with alternative-fueled vehicles, according to Barry Greenberg of Knoxville Area Transit. “These [trolleys] are … Read more
