Behind Closed Doors: Knoxville Museum of Art

New Knoxville Brewing Company
Tennessee Theater
The Orangery
Waste Water Treatment Plant

Deep in the bowels of the Knoxville Museum of Art, 220 primitive faces lie silently on a plywood table. No, they're not the shrunken heads of disobedient interns (that's the other room). These Oaxacan masks, replicas of the ones used in pre-Hispanic South America, are actually part of something that the Museum would like people to know about--its permanent collection. Few people are aware that a museum as small as Knoxville's would have its own collection, and they would be even more surprised to learn the KMA plans to send 75 of the masks on tour, to the Madison Morgan Cultural Center in Madison, Georgia.

It took five 18-wheelers carrying crates this size (below) and larger to transport the Red Grooms exhibit from New York to Knoxville; the transporters thought they could fit all the pieces into three trucks, but ended up needing more, mostly for the life-sized bus that is the star of the show. Donald Fain (bottom right) is the in-house master carpenter of the KMA; he builds displays for the artwork, walls and cubicles for the offices, and is most notably responsible for the construction of the ArtCade.

It was conveyed to its place in this colossal freight elevator (above), which, at 2,073,600 cubic inches, is large enough (and they've tried this) to fit a grand piano and player. The Rodin show is another memorable event that filled the elevator to capacity.