Kinney folk art on display until July 5

The Arts Center of Cannon County announces the opening of ‘Slow Time: The Works of Charley, Noah and Hazel Kinney,’ now on exhibit in the Marly Berger Gallery and Arts Center Museum now through July 5. The Kentucky Folk Art Center produced this exhibition which includes more than 80 works, including paintings, drawings, three dimensional works and carvings.

Charley and Noah Kinney were born six years apart ‘ 1906 and 1912 respectively ‘ into a life of subsistence farming not so far removed from that eked out by early white settlers in Northeast Kentucky. Noah married Hazel in 1960, and she took up visual art after coming to live on the brothers’ farm. Charlie and Noah died within six months of each other in 1991.

‘The Kinney brothers are the stuff from which myths and legends so easily arise,’ states Adria Swain, KFAC curator. ‘As artists and musicians, Charley and Noah were local standard bearers of their culture, and of a way of life that they adhered to long after most others had abandoned it for generic late 20th century America. All that discussion notwithstanding, the art is powerful; it stirs your gut. The Kinneys are the real thing.’

This exhibition has been made possible by the National Endowment for the Arts, as part of American Masterpieces: Three Centuries of Artistic Genius, as well as grant from The Judith Rothschild Foundation and The Kentucky Arts Council.

Admission to ‘Slow Time’ is free. The galleries are open 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Monday through Saturday. The Arts Center is located on 1424 John Bragg Highway, just west of the town of Woodbury, approximately 20 minutes form Murfreesboro, Manchester, and McMinnville and one hour southeast of Nashville.

Office hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday through Saturday. For more information pleased call 615-563-2787 or 1-800-235-9073.

Founded in 1990, the award-winning Arts Center of Cannon County is a unique model for rural arts organizations. Situated in an under-served rural area in a town of 2,000 and a county of 12,000, The Arts Center annually attracts more than 40,000 visitors from a region covering over a 100-mile radius. Drawing on the blue-collar roots of its community, the organization focuses on self-sufficiency, fiscal responsibility and social entrepreneurship. The Arts Center is partially funded by the Tennessee Arts Commission, Southern Arts Federation and the National Endowment for the Arts.