Tennessee Voices
About Tennessee Voices
Tennessee Voices highlights the people and stories represented across UT Libraries’ collections. Through performances, interviews, films, and archival materials, the program connects visitors with voices that reflect Tennessee’s music, communities, landscapes, and lived experiences.
Each featured collection brings together related resources, making it easier to explore the people behind the stories and discover the broader materials preserved by UT Libraries.
Boundless
Boundless: Artists in the Archives connects artists with materials from UT Libraries’ special collections and archives, inspiring new creative work rooted in historical collections.
Trisha Gene Brady
Trisha Gene Brady’s work draws on materials from the Fifty Years in Cades Cove collection, connecting archival records of the Smokies with contemporary performance.
Trisha Gene Brady : Boundless
Explore Trisha Gene Brady’s Boundless feature and watch the full performance inspired by materials from UT Libraries’ collections.
Fifty Years in Cades Cove
Explore the archival collection that served as source material for Trisha Gene Brady’s Boundless work.
Cades Cove: The Life and Death of a Southern Appalachian Community
Explore Durwood Dunn’s history of the Cades Cove community, developed using materials from the same archival collection.
Artists in the Archives
Discover the broader Boundless series, which connects artists with UT Libraries’ archives and special collections.
Donald Brown
Donald Brown’s Boundless work connects with the life and legacy of Knoxville-born artist Beauford Delaney and materials preserved in the Beauford Delaney Papers.
Donald Brown: Boundless
Explore Donald Brown’s Boundless feature and full performance inspired by the life, work, and legacy of Beauford Delaney.
Beauford Delaney: A Rediscovered Genius
Explore the UT Libraries exhibition highlighting Beauford Delaney’s life, artistic legacy, and materials from the Beauford Delaney Papers.
Beauford Delaney Papers
Explore the archival collection documenting Delaney’s life and work through correspondence, photographs, sketches, sketchbooks, and other personal materials.
Rising from the Ashes
Rising from the Ashes preserves personal stories and artistic responses connected to the Chimney Tops 2 wildfires. Through oral histories, artwork, and related publications, the project documents how individuals and communities experienced, remembered, and responded to the fires.
Bob Sweeney
Bob Sweeney’s story is part of the Rising from the Ashes oral history project, which captures firsthand experiences of the Chimney Tops 2 wildfires and their lasting impact.
Bob Sweeney Oral History
Hear Bob Sweeney reflect on his experience of the Chimney Tops 2 wildfires as part of the Rising from the Ashes oral history project.
Bob Sweeney Prays
Explore Bob Sweeney Prays, an artwork connected to Sweeney’s story and the broader Rising from the Ashes project.
Rising from the Ashes Interviews
Browse additional firsthand accounts documenting experiences and memories connected to the Chimney Tops 2 wildfires.
Rising from the Ashes: The Chimney Tops 2 Wildfires in Memory and Art
Explore the UT Press exhibition catalog bringing together oral histories, memories, and artwork connected to the wildfires.
William Derris Film Collection
The William Derris Film Collection preserves home movies documenting everyday life in and around the Great Smoky Mountains. Derris, who owned the Derris Motel in Townsend, recorded scenes from the region from the mid-1940s through the 1960s.
William Derris
William Derris captured everyday life in the Smokies through film and photography, creating a visual record of the region and its communities over several decades.
William Derris Film & Slide Collection
Explore films and slides from the William Derris Collection documenting life, landscapes, and communities in and around the Great Smoky Mountains.