ABOVE: Artist S.R. Wheeler describes her piece “00:00” as in the style of the 1950s Cinderella Disney film to reflect the innocence of childhood narratives and stories. Wheeler has several art forms on display at the Red Rock Center for the Arts, including ceramics, oil paintings, watercolors and photography.

FAIRMONT – After three years at the University of Minnesota, Fairmont native S.R. Wheeler is hosting her first solo show at the Red Rock Center for the Arts in Fairmont.

The show, running from June 16-30, has dozens of pieces, including around 32 ceramic pieces, nine watercolors, five oil paintings and five photography prints. For Wheeler, the artistic journey started when she was young and never let up.

“I think that everyone sort of starts out their childhood making artwork,” she said. “Everyone picks up a paintbrush and makes a mess on a canvas, and then their mom keeps it for a million years. I did it for a lot longer than from ages 0 to 5. I didn’t really know that I was going to be going into the art industry until I graduated high school. At that point I was like, ‘I enjoy art, I love art, I’m good at it. I might as well go into it.'”

It was at the U of M that she discovered her love for ceramics, after making it into the university’s Fine Arts program on her first try. Since then she has tackled several challenging projects, including one utilizing colored pencils and chandeliers and was entirely inside a room, all things which Wheeler hates using or drawing.

“The colored pencil is in the style of the 1950s Cinderella original animated Disney film to reflect the innocence of childhood narratives and the stories,” she said.

While this is her first solo show, Wheeler has had her work displayed in the Regis West and Cube Galleries in the Twin Cities, and this fall she will have her work displayed at the Nash Gallery up there as well.

Regarding how this opportunity came together for her at the Red Rock Center for the Arts, Wheeler said it was a part of one of her class finals.

“Part of our final was we were required to apply to three different opportunities,” she said. “I just sent the Red Rock Center an email. I was like, ‘Hey, I’ve received the Red Rock Secondary Education Scholarship twice, I have my work exhibited at The Hub, I’ve like been a counselor for the STEAM Day summer camp at the Red Rock Center. I’d love to have a show there.”

Once it was settled, Wheeler set to work on what she was going to place in the gallery. While most of it is her work from her junior year at the U of M, she did make an exception for her mother, who asked Wheeler to display some of her children’s book illustrations that are some of Wheeler’s older work.

ABOVE: Outside of her show, Wheeler has also been painting this mural at Imagine Martin’s The Hub in Fairmont, where she currently interns and has some more of her work displayed.

While she has plenty of ceramics coming, one piece Wheeler could not bring, called Surface, is there in print form.

“It is an eight foot by five foot ceramic wall sculpture that includes 78 pieces, and is formed from a slip over under glaze once fire technique that I invented this last semester over the course of two months of research whilst in conversation with five different experts in my field,” she said. “It is the piece I’m proudest of. It took the longest amount of time, a lot of research and I’m working on patenting the technique used to make it.”

From all of her artistic endeavors and schooling, much of which is represented in her show, Wheeler said art is an adventure and a form of expression.

“We have language to express ourselves fully verbally, and we have different art mediums to express ourselves fully tactilely,” she said. “For me, ceramics is a really good way to process. I’ve used ceramics as an outlet for trauma. I’ve used it as an outlet for celebration. It’s a really good way for me to process long-term situations and emotions, and developing my style there has been so much fun. It’s very science-based and methodical, and it’s so deeply rooted in technique in a way that painting isn’t.”

Wheeler hasn’t been at the Red Rock all the time since the show started, which she said is because a lot of what they are taught is how to display their artwork separate from the artist themselves. With the artist reception from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. on Friday, June 26, she is looking forward to taking advantage of having it in a smaller setting.

“It’s easy to say, ‘Hey, that’s a picture of the artist that looks like this person, I can just go talk to this person.’ Because of that, I’m able to talk to people about my work while standing next to my work in a way that I cannot do at larger galleries, and I am very excited about that.”

Moving forward, Wheeler said she will continue to be participating and hosting events both here and in the Twin Cities. She is also looking to sell her artwork moving forward, getting her Master’s while studying abroad and then potentially pursuing a bigger role at Imagine Martin, where she is interning at this summer through the Martin County/ Minnesota Valley Action Council summer internship program.

For more information, visit redrockcenter.org/