Live music and open house art gallery exhibits highlight a two weekend Art Walk in downtown Bryson City this month.

The bluegrass/gospel band Earl and the Boys will perform at 7 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 15, at the Swain County Center for the Arts and The Swannanoa Valley Players will perform “Mountain Tales” at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 22.

All seven participating Swain County galleries will be open to the public from 1-7 p.m. both Saturdays of the Art Walk. The community exhibit at Swain County Center for the Arts will represent 35 Western North Carolina artists with over 150 works of art. Artists will be demonstrating their media and techniques and showing additional artwork just during Art Walk. The six downtown Bryson City galleries participating in this event include The Elizabeth Ellison Gallery, The Everett Street Gallery, Homestead Gardens Gallery, The Michael Kesselring Gallery, Heath Creations Studio and Gallery, and The Tieke Owl Studio. Refreshments will be served at most locations. Look for the purple and yellow balloons to identify the galleries and pick up a map at any of these locations.

The artwork ranges from realistic to abstract to folk art with a wide variety of media represented — watercolor, acrylic, oil and pastel paintings; serigraphs; lino-cuts; pencil and colored pencil drawings; mixed media with ink and pastel; photography; stone carvings; pottery; baskets; handmade paper; twig sculptures; counted cross stitch; crochet; enameling; and batik.

Swain County Center for the Arts is located at Swain County High School at 1415 Fontana Road in Bryson City. For more information, call Jenny Johnson at 828.488.7843 or go to www.swaincountyschools.com/cfta/index.htm. For more information on Art Walk call The Swain County Chamber of Commerce at 828.488.3681.