The Wichita Falls Museum of Arts closed its community exhibit “Making the Cut” on Friday, Jan. 19. The closing reception featured pieces created by multiple middle and high school students from throughout the city who attended the museum’s steamroller events in the fall. 

“The project started in October, where we had workshops showing students and teachers how to cut on the wood,” museum interim director Catherine Prose said, “We wrote a grant to fund all of the wood, all of the cutting materials, all the paper, all of the supplies.” 

Curator of education Sarah Griego planned the steamroller events and showcase, and said it required time and effort. 

“It was a lot of research,” Griego said. “It was a lot of talking to other people who threw steamroller events. Constantly asking them questions in their emails. Just a lot, a lot, of research and planning until, honestly, the week of. It was non-stop.” 

The program allows students to learn new skills, while also teaching skills that they can utilize in the workforce. 

“Employers want people who can problem solve quickly, have creative things skills, because everything is about innovation, right?” Prose said, “Our schools tend to teach in kind of like a box and so projects like this help you to break out of that box and use your individual creativity.” 

The museum plans on offering the more educational classes in the coming months.

“We’ll be having more community based events. Organizations from the community reach out to us to help create an event within our facilities, so you’ll see a lot of those,” Griego said, “We have plenty of workshops in the spring. So planner painting, paper making, collage, collagraph, all of that.” 

The museum offers other exhibits from artists from Wichita Falls and around the world.