Beginning July 20, the Reece Museum began their showing of “Blighted Pine: Appalachian Ancestors,” and will continue showing this exhibit until Friday, Sept. 23.
This exhibit explores the connections between people in the past and present with their living conditions, specifically in Appalachia.
This exhibit features poetry from Jesse Graves, the poet in residence at East Tennessee State University. The poetry is from his 2022 Tennessee Landscape with Blighted Pine (Tenth Anniversary Edition).
Jesse Graves began teaching at ETSU in 2009, and he teaches undergraduate and graduate classes in creative writing and poetry. He has authored three poetry collections: “Tennessee Landscape with Blighted Pine” (Texas Review Press, 2011), “Basin Ghosts” (Texas Review Press, 2014) and “Specter Mountain”, co-authored with William Wright. He was inducted into the East Tennessee Writers Hall of Fame in 2015.
Alongside the poems come the interpretations of the poems from students who attended Tennessee’s Governor’s School. Museum staff also paired artifacts to accompany the poetry that already belonged to the Reece Museum or that they borrowed from colleagues.
The Reece Museum provided, “Beginning as a component of the Governor’s School for the Scientific Exploration of Tennessee Heritage, the original GOV’ HUB exhibition evolved into a larger project that brings ideas of memory and ancestry to the forefront. Please enjoy touring the various displays featuring artifacts from the Reece Museum permanent collection as well as loaned items from museum staff and colleagues.”
The Reece Museum is a unit of the Center of Excellence for Appalachian Studies and Services, which is housed in the ETSU Department of Appalachian Studies. The Reece Museum is located on the campus of East Tennessee State University and is open Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. For more information, please visit www.etsu.edu/reece or by phone (423) 439-4392.
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