Art & Community

With a fierce love for helping others, Kristy Peloquin’s career has always gravitated towards public service. After earning her MFA in poetry and creative writing from Texas State University, she began a career teaching writing and composition that spanned nine years and included Texas State University, Austin Community College, and Huston-Tillotson University.

In addition to teaching, Kristy has nearly a decade of nonprofit experience and community service. She co-created a therapeutic creative writing program for a nonprofit serving those suffering through grief and loss. She went on to join Pop-Up Birthday, a nonprofit serving children in foster care, and became the organization’s inaugural executive director. She also engaged her love for storytelling and all things Texan by serving as development manager for a statewide historic preservation organization. In this role, she directed an impactful internship program that helped students from underrepresented cultural backgrounds access pivotal, career-enhancing internships. Today, Kristy serves on the board of directors for Learning Bridge, a nonprofit that provides specialized tutoring for children in foster care and unhoused youth.

In her role as executive director of projectART, Kristy draws upon her deep love for the arts and strong commitment to ensuring equitable access to education. She believes in the critical role the arts play in our lives to help us connect, advocate, express, and grow.

Lauren’s pillars of education are advocacy, access, and connection. With more than 15 years of experience in public education—as a classroom teacher in East Austin and as a Dyslexia Coordinator and Interventionist in Blanco—she brings both experience and heart to her role as Education Manager at projectART. She holds a Master’s degree in Advanced Literacy Instruction and has spent her career supporting students with diverse learning needs, creating inclusive learning environments, and championing access to meaningful educational and artistic experiences for all children.

Lauren is especially passionate about the arts as a transformative space, particularly when academics or life circumstances feel limiting. She believes the arts can open doors, build confidence, foster belonging and connection, and help young people discover their voice through creative expression. As she often reminds her students: in art, there are no wrong answers.

When she’s not working with students and educators, Lauren surrounds herself with friends, family, animals, plants, books, travel, and laughter. Most days, you can find her and her husband raising their own artists on their flower farm—growing and arranging blooms and leading botanical workshops as another way she nurtures creativity, connection, and growth in her community.

Being of service to others has been a constant for Nazish. From volunteering in high school, through her career as a physical therapist, to owning a local business, she has been committed to serving her community and creating a sense of togetherness. This led her to the nonprofit sector, where she continues to connect with others and be of service to kids and creativity. 

Nazish lives in San Marcos and enjoys working out, baking, playing tennis, reading, sewing, and traveling with her husband and their two children.

Conner is a multi-instrumentalist, painter, and ceramics artist. He grew up in Wimberley and is a Senior at Katherine Anne Porter School. He has participated in projectMENTOR three times as a student, so when the opportunity to become a Summer Intern at projectART presented itself, he knew this was the place for him. He then became a Program Assistant where he continues his goal of helping kids experience the same opportunities projectART has given him.

In his free time, Conner enjoys working on his truck, training his dog, and performing with his band. He is the student head of his school’s lunch program and former manager of his school band. He is dedicated to ensuring our local children get the chance to experience the arts in their own creative and unique ways. 

Avery Herndon is originally from H-town and spent her last 5 years of public school in Boerne, Texas. She is currently a senior at Texas State University majoring in Studio Art and minoring in Art History. Avery has been in public school art classes since Kindergarten and has spent her youth learning painting at The Woodlands Academy of Art.

In her free time, Avery can be found riding her bike, swimming at the San Marcos River, or out-of-town traveling or hiking! After finishing her bachelor's degree, Avery expects to continue expanding her art skills in her free time or even in graduate school, and she ultimately plans on becoming a middle-school art teacher.

Mary Grace is a certified teacher with a Bachelors and Masters Degree from Texas A&M University. She has many years of teaching experience in the regular classroom as well as the art classroom and also enjoys painting professionally. Mary Grace loves working with children and fostering creativity as art encourages students to be original, challenge themselves, think creatively, gain confidence, appreciate perspective, experiment, and learn history - all while making a big mess and having fun!

Dee Dee is currently a high school teacher at IDEA College Prep in Kyle Texas. She teaches AP Environmental Science. Her three main passions in life are science, education, and art. She is always looking for opportunities to mix the three, from her time studying science education in her M.S. program to her classroom. She has always been artistic, and in her spare time she is always drawing, sewing, crocheting or learning a new art form. She is looking forward to blending science and art into some amazing Summer camps at projectART. 

Cynthia Carroll is a retired teacher with 40+ years experience. She loves using art to enhance the magical world of children's literature. She cannot wait to see her students’ imaginations soar!

Teresa Davis is a professional artist, art educator, and mother of three who brings both expertise and heart into every classroom she leads. With an MFA in Printmaking/Intermedia and an active studio practice, her work spans a wide range of media including acrylic painting, mixed media, performance, and installation art, with an emphasis on curiosity, process, and intentional design. Teresa is passionate about creating a warm, disciplined, and encouraging environment where students build technical skill, creative confidence, and a genuine joy for making art.

Lisa Duncan received undergraduate degrees in English and Journalism, and a Masters degree in Curriculum and Instruction. After several years spent in the high-tech world in Austin, she fled to the Hill Country, where she spent the next 18 years as a teacher, specializing in reading and writing. She became certified as a yoga instructor in 2016, and looks forward to weaving yoga and meditation into her instruction in this new setting.  

Vera Dyson is an early childhood educator with nearly 20 years teaching experience. Much of this experience has been as the Lead Guide in a Montessori school. She currently leads the Kindergarten classroom at Tiny Tree School in Wimberley. Vera has also enjoyed teaching yoga and art to both children and adults. 

Sam is a contemporary fiber artist and weaver. Her art reflects a devotion for natural fibers, a deep respect for both traditional and contemporary fiber arts and memories of the New Mexico sheep ranch where she spent her childhood. In addition to a career as a clinical therapist, Sam studied fiber arts at Texas Woman’s University. Her work has been shown in galleries from Santa Fe to Boston, and today, continues her studio work in Wimberley. 

Rosalind Ellis is a retired teacher of 29 years! She taught mostly Kindergarten and first grade and loved every minute of it. Since her retirement, she has been tutoring kids after school. During her years in the classroom she tried to incorporate art as much as possible in her lessons. Rosalind is so very excited to have the opportunity to work with students in art experiences again in a new way! 

Jennifer Enloe has been teaching art for 25 years to elementary, high school, and college students. She has her BA in art and MA in teaching from Austin College.

Rhea Fitzgerald, a current Upper Elementary Language Arts, Social Studies, Math, and Art teacher at Blanco River Academy (BRAc) in Wimberley, has taught and exhibited her own work throughout the Midwest, the South, and Texas.

Laura Greene is a professional artist with over 20 years teaching experience. She currently offers private lessons and is a regular projectART instructor.

Wilson Marks piloted the Maplewood Ukulele and Drum Choirs in Austin and currently teaches general music in Hays CISD. He’s worked in public education for over 16 years and is an active performing or session guitarist and singer songwriter / sideman around and beyond the Austin area, often playing with his trio, the McMercy Family Band, Matt the Electrician, Jitterbug Vipers, and more.

Mickey May is an ATX based improvisor, educator, and writer. She teaches with The Hideout Theatre and is a professor of instruction at Texas State University.

Jennifer Ober, a graduate of UT Austin with a BFA in Studio Art, added her TX teaching certification in 2001. She taught K-6 art in Austin ISD for 10 years, earning Teacher of the Year in 2007. Upon moving to Wimberley, she began offering summer camps and after school art classes out of her private studio and taught K-12 art at Hill Country Academy in Dripping Springs. These days, she donates her time to projectART as a founding board member and regular instructor.

Jarae has 28 years of teaching experience in grades 2-4 as well as Reading and Math Intervention for K-5. She is certified in Early Education-8th Grade and ESL, with an additional Reading certification in 1-8. In Austin ISD, she was the Campus Dyslexia Designee, in charge of testing students and training teachers. She has taught in Austin, Kyle, and now Wimberley for the last eight years.  

Pearly Rihn is the creator and maker of the slow-fashion clothing line The Traveling Kind, created here in Wimberley. She graduated from UT at Austin, with a BA in Costume Design, and has worked in costume and fashion design and construction, as well as interior design.

Julie Smith is inspired by the beautiful treasures found within nature and has been a guide for children since 2008. She comes to projectART as both an educator and artist with a heart for guiding children to explore and notice the creative spirit within all of us.

Leslie Tharp has been teaching for 16 years and is the art teacher at Danforth Junior High in Wimberley ISD. She graduated from Texas State University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts, with a specialization in Digital and Photographic Imaging.

Alex Trippe is an artist and art educator working in ceramics, glass, and sculpture. In her work, she examines objects as remnants of earthly experience to parse out what it means to be touched, emotionally and physically, by the world and by one another. As an educator, she emphasizes approaching art with care, intention, and a reverence for making and the creative spirit. She received her BFA in Photography from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and her MFA in Visual Art from the Ohio State University.