Liminal Light: Winter's Vigil
Our February exhibition, Liminal Light, explores the threshold between darkness and dawn, where winter's quiet transforms into luminous possibility.
There's something about light in February—the way it slants through bare branches, promising spring but not quite delivering. It's a liminal light, caught between what was and what might be. And maybe that's exactly where we find ourselves right now: in a prolonged flux after Helene, in the middle of a winter that feels longer than most, in a political moment when darkness seems to be gaining ground.
Liminal Light, presented by ArtsvilleUSA, is an exhibition born from this in-between place. Gathered from 11 makers across the 23 counties of WNC are objects that do what craft has always done best—transform raw material into meaning. Ceramic candleholders that cup flame like a prayer. Fluorescent goblets that turn ordinary water into something magical. Flower lamps that bloom even when the ground outside is frozen. Luminescent jewelry that holds light against the body, close as a heartbeat.
These aren't just beautiful things, though they are that. They're arguments made in clay and glass and metal—arguments that light persists, that making matters, that the work of human hands can push back against despair. In a region still rebuilding livelihoods and a sense of normalcy, in a country navigating authoritarianism's creeping shadows, these objects insist on something radical: that there is still beauty to be made, light to be kindled, hope to be held.
Learn more about the artists in Liminal Light, then view the exhibition below.