If the arts in Asheville were a representative democracy, it might look a lot like a new coalition built by the Asheville Area Arts Council.

Julyan Davis has evolved into a novelist in part through stubbornness but, as he sees it, also by necessity. Davis is far from blind, but degenerating eyesight has prompted visits over the past decade to ophthalmologists.

On a recent Friday night, the avant garde musical duo Okapi performed for a handful of people at Revolve in Asheville. The only illumination came from two table lamps and a few candles behind them and a string of tiny footlights along the cement floor.

In the early 2010s, anyone following the author Wiley Cash on Facebook would find what they’d likely expect. There were posts about Cash’s upcoming books and readings, raves about other authors and some photos of Cash’s wife and the birth of their first child. But toward the middle of the decade, Cash began sprinkling in posts of a more political nature.

Decades before he retired from the ministry, Fred Northup devoted himself to a more creative calling.

Alicia Armstrong can’t count how many times she has turned down Jeremy Russell.

Whether on stage or on the page, Gina Cornejo has always brought a focus and fluidity to her identity. For now, she uses the pronouns she/her and they/them.

“Searching For Jimmy Page” isn’t merely the title of Christy Hallberg’s debut novel. It was an obsession that once compelled Hallberg to hatch a wild plan to meet the Led Zeppelin guitarist.

Live music venues in and around Asheville are back to hosting shows, but it’s anything but business as usual.

A little after noon Sunday in Asheville’s Pack Square, the first sounds indicating a turning point for the Asheville Symphony Orchestra came from Alicia Chapman, an oboe player testing out a series of reeds for optimal outdoor performance.