Much of Asheville’s original East End neighborhood, once a center of Black residential and professional life, was destroyed by the city’s urban renewal policies between the 1960s and early 1990s. Before it was erased, local photographer Andrea Clark captured over 200 images of the community’s landscape, buildings and people.
The second part of an exhibit of these photos, The Photography of Andrea Clark: Remembering Asheville’s East End Community, opened at the Asheville Museum of History on Feb. 12 and continues through the end of May.
Clark was born and raised in Massachusetts, where she studied photography. In the 1960s, she moved to Asheville to live with her father. She is the granddaughter of influential Asheville master brick mason James Vester Miller.
The museum will also celebrate Black History Month with two other offerings. The free Community Day event, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 11 a.m.-5 p.m., will include children’s activities and an 11:30 a.m. program with YMI Cultural Center Executive Director the Rev. Sean Hasker Palmer on the history of the YMI. On Tuesday, Feb. 25, 6-7 p.m., painter LaKisha Blount will present Echoes of Texana: The Families That Made It a Community, exploring the historically Black town of Texana in Cherokee County, founded by Blount’s ancestor, Texana McClelland. avl.mx/ejg
