Rotarian Gay Lyons introduced Sherry Jenkins, the executive director of Dogwood Arts, noting that Sherry has a BFA and an MFA from UT and has led Dogwood since 2017.
Sherry began by noting that 2025 will be the 70th anniversary of the Dogwood Trail, noting that there are now 14 all over town. She gave a brief history of Dogwood Arts, going back to the 1947 words in John Gunther’s book Inside USA that Knoxville was the “ugliest city I ever saw in America.” This basically sparked the Knoxville Garden Club to promote the beauty of Knoxville. The Dogwood Arts Festival was incorporated in 1961 as a two-week-long event.
They have dropped the “festival” from their name, since there are so many other facets of their activities. She noted Dogwood Arts’ mission statement: “Our mission is to promote and celebrate the art, culture, and natural beauty of our region.” Along with the three-day event at World’s Fair Park, Dogwood sponsors public art in the form of murals, the “chalk walk,” and youth programs in art and music that go all year round.
Last year Dogwood events had 87,000 visitors to its 66 events involving 1,500 artists and musicians. They also planted 2,000 dogwood trees because dogwoods have a life span of about 15 years in urban settings and need to be replaced with newer ones.
Sherry then introduced her marketing and creative director, Shannon Herron, who pointed the growth of Dogwood Arts and said his mission in part is to introduce Dogwood Arts to the next generation. He thanked local media outlets for the great cooperation Dogwood Arts gets to its community-focused efforts supported by local businesses.
He is always thinking about new audiences, and uses eight social media accounts as a direct link to the community, focusing on art, gardening, music, students, trails, etc.
Sherry returned to the podium to note that her small staff of seven accomplishes quite a lot. They survive thanks to fundraising, grant funding (like the Tennessee Arts Commission), and corporate sponsorships. (Their biggest is ORNL Federal Credit Union.
Chris Lambert asked about the impact that Dogwood Arts has, and Sherry noted that we get a lot of attention nationally from our murals and the chalk walk.