Welcome to Wheelhouse Studios
Art education shouldn’t be a privilege, but right now, it is. As public funding for the arts continues to dwindle, schools and nonprofits are often forced to cut essential programs, leaving a growing number of K-12 students without access to meaningful creative learning opportunities. Wheelhouse Studios seeks to bridge this gap by offering an accessible, online art education curriculum designed for high school students with an interest or talent in visual art.
Creativity
✳︎
Curiosity
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Community
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Creativity ✳︎ Curiosity ✳︎ Community ✳︎
Our Mission
Our Vision
The mission of Wheelhouse Studios is to provide accessible, high-quality visual art education opportunities where students will develop technical, professional, and interpersonal skills that will lead to lasting success in their education and career.
Wheelhouse Studios seeks to cultivate a thriving creative community that empowers students to reach their personal and professional goals, fosters interdisciplinary artistic collaboration, and champions art education for all.
Wheelhouse Studios seeks to cultivate a thriving creative community that empowers students to reach their personal and professional goals, fosters interdisciplinary artistic collaboration, and champions art education for all.
Featured Lessons
Below is a sampling of the Wheelhouse Studios curriculum. Through interactive online tutorials and lessons, students will have the opportunity to explore a wide range of mediums and study contemporary artists.
Home Still Life
As an introductory project, students will draw a still life from live observation using objects in their school or home. The artist featured in this lesson is Nicole Dyer, whose work tackles themes of consumerism by using bright colors and iconic brands/logos to elicit a response in the viewer. This lesson is meant to begin developing students’ technical skills in drawing while introducing them to the idea of using art to convey a message about a social issue, which they have the option to do themselves in other lessons.
Posters and Infographics
In this lesson, students will be tasked with making a poster or infographic about an issue they care about. Students may choose to tackle an issue as simple as a wish for better food in the school cafeteria or as complex as a desire to end global climate change. For inspiration, students will look to the work of M. Fatchurofi, an artist who creates work about mindfulness as well as corporate/editorial illustrations. This project is intended to give students the opportunity to present their voice using imagery.
Personal Environments
In this lesson, students will look at images of tv and movie characters’ rooms and analyze how choices made in the set design can tell the viewer something about the character. Students will then view work from Shae Myles, a contemporary artist whose recent exhibition features a Polly Pocket-style bedroom meant to represent her identity. Students will then craft 3D dioramas of a room or environment that is personal to them and explain their choices in an artist statement. This lesson is intended to introduce students to working three-dimensionally and develop their ability to analyze visual imagery.
Fiber Art Sampler
Students will select an excerpt from a song, poem, or other work of literature with personal significance and incorporate it into a fiber artwork using hand-embroidery techniques. Students will explore the use of visuals to tell a story by incorporating imagery that connects with their selected text. The artist featured in this lesson is Aram Han Sifuentes, who incorporates text into much of her fiber work to convey messages about oppression and identity.
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