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Our instructors are drawn from a wealth of talented teachers, including nationally known artists from across the country and across the street. They are innovative craftsmen and artists who enjoy trying new techniques and love sharing what they do with their students.
If you are an experienced art, craft, writing, or performing arts instructor and are interested in teaching at Shake Rag Alley, click here for more information.
The jewelry that Sarah Mann designs and handcrafts skillfully merges geometric and organic elements to create a style that is recognizably her own. She was introduced to metalsmithing at the University of Wisconsin in her hometown of Milwaukee. She furthered her interest under the expert guidance of Heikki Seppa at Washington Universty in St. Louis and at Fuji Studio in Florence, Italy. She then lived in New Orleans, where she worked amidst its thriving community of metalsmiths and honed her skills in preparation for a transition to New York City. The dynamism of the city inspired the strong form and kinetic elements in her pieces. She has since returned to her roots in the Midwest and continues her silversmithing here, creating bold yet elegant jewelry with unique surface treatments.
Sarah introduces a new line consisting of earrings, necklaces, bracelets, and rings about every 10 months. She herself carefully crafts each and every piece and presents it as one of a limited edition.
Workshops
Roann Mathias is an artist and educator who is experienced in a variety of media including abstract painting, photography, watercolor, and lettering. All of these varied interests can be seen in her art. Her work has been published in Somerset Studio Magazine, Letter Arts Review and Cloth Paper Scissors magazine. She taught calligraphy and mixed media workshops for several years throughout the U.S. and Canada. After receiving her MFA in 2015, she became an adjunct professor at Memphis College of Art and Southwest Tennessee Community College. Originally from New Orleans, the colorful architecture and plant life instilled in her a love of color and nature. Travels around the U.S. and Europe inspired her love of nature and the landscape. Influenced by her study of art history, she has drawn on abstract expressionism to create large gestural works.
Workshops
Andrea Matus is a visual artist living in Vancouver, BC, who exhibits as well as teaches her unique combination of painting, collage, assemblage, and sculpture throughout the world with collectors in Canada, the United States, Europe, and Australia.
In her art, Matus creates powerful visual statements of the role of women in both history and mythology. Through her culling of images from contemporary sources, historic iconography, travels, and original designs, a sense of surreal worlds is evoked. Combining color, symbolism and ornamentation, each motif is a transport to a different time, place, and culture. Through her process, discordant shapes and designs are manipulated to find harmony where at first there seems none. A part of the human experience is created when these collections form new narratives and meanings.
The improvisational nature of collage coupled with the very deliberate method of painting creates a balance of spontaneity and premeditation in her work.
Workshops
Shane McAdams is artist, writer, curator, educator, and papa residing in Cedarburg, WI. His artwork has been exhibited at Allegra LaViola Gallery, Marlborough, Chelsea, Elizabeth Leach Gallery in Portland, OR, Scream London, and Artistree in Hong Kong, China, The Schneider Museum, The Haggerty Museum of Art, The Kohler Art Center, as well as other venues. His work has been reviewed in Vogue Magazine, The New York Times, The New York Observer, The Huffington Post, and The Village Voice. He has taught at the Rhode Island School of Design and Marian University. He is a three-time Creative Capital, Andy Warhol Writer’s Grant finalist, and his writing appeared regularly in the Brooklyn Rail from 2002 to 2012. He has also contributed to The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and currently writes for the Shepherd Express for which he received the Visual Arts Achievement in Arts Writing from the Wisconsin Academy of Arts and Letters. In addition to writing and painting, he is also a co-partner in REAL TINSEL, an art space on the South side of Milwaukee.
Workshops
I work out of a home studio in Mount Horeb, Wisconsin & I am one of only a handful of makers worldwide who craft with the accumulated buildup of spraypaint and mural paint from active graffiti hotspots. My tools reveal swirling colors and patterns, exploring various eras and topographical features which are an unrepeatable part of street art history. Public art is ephemeral, and my work seeks to celebrate and preserve it.
Workshops
Trained as a painter, Richard Moninski received a bachelor of fine arts degree from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and a master of fine arts from the University at Albany, State University of New York. He completed additional study in surface design at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City.
Moninski is strongly influenced by history, nature, and numerous decorative arts traditions. His paintings and drawings have been exhibited nationally. Awards include a grant from the American-Scandinavian Foundation for research in Norway, and artist residencies at the Vermont Studio Center, the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Ragdale Foundation, and the Roger Tory Peterson Institute. An educator with over 20 years of experience, he has employed diverse media and approaches in the course of his teaching.
Workshops
Joanne Nelson is the author of the collection, My Neglected Gods, and the memoir, This Is How We Leave (both from Vine Leaves Press). Her writing appears in anthologies and literary journals such as Brevity, The Museum of Americana, and Redivider. Nelson writes creative non-fiction, essays, poetry, and commentaries on craft.
Certified as a meditation and mindfulness teacher by the McLean Meditation Institute, Nelson leads retreats and workshops on topics related to meditation, writing, and creativity. She also teaches creative writing classes for the continuing education program at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee at Waukesha. Nelson lives in Hartland, Wisconsin, where she develops and leads community programs, maintains a psychotherapy practice, and adjuncts. She holds an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars and an MSSW from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Workshops
Gary Warren Niebuhr is a found object, mixed media, collage and assemblage artist. Gary’s art has been included in exhibitions at Alverno College (Milwaukee, WI), Anderson Arts Center (Kenosha, WI), ARTgarage (Green Bay, WI), Cedarburg Cultural Center (WI), Fond du Lac Public Library (WI), Grafton Arts Mill (WI), Hilliard Gallery (Kansas City, MO), Kenosha Public Museum (WI), John Michael Kohler Arts Center (Sheboygan, WI), Monmouth Museum of Art (NJ), Mount Mary University (Wauwatosa, WI), Museum of Wisconsin Art (West Bend, WI), Re:Vision Gallery and Artist Studio (Kenosha, WI), Two Fish Gallery (Elkhart Lake, WI), Walker’s Point Center for the Arts (Milwaukee, WI), and the Wustum Museum (Racine, WI). Gary’s art is represented by Dee-Construction Gallery (Mineral Point). A10-year retrospective of Gary’s work was hung at the Milwaukee High School of the Arts in 2106. Gary was the curator of Connections, an exhibition of assemblage art at Re:Vision Gallery and Artist Studio in 2017 and had a solo exhibition at the Anderson Arts Center in 2021 called Nailing Crap Together and Calling It Art.
Gary served 40 years as a public librarian and now enjoys his retirement making art, take photographs, gardening, and watching old films and current sports. Gary lives in Milwaukee with his wife Denice and his cats Boginskaya and Biakabutuka.
Workshops
I live in Mineral Point, the best small town in America! This is my 32nd year teaching elementary art. I am a practicing artist with work in a few galleries and have participated in many shows over the years. Unless it is a commission from a client, most of my artwork starts out as a dream, so I work in a variety of media, depending on the dream.
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Nancy has taught middle and high school art, worked with artist residencies, and taken students on trips to New York from her home in South Dakota. In her own work, she has explored pattern making, quilting, doll animation, sidewalk chalk art, and character development and expressive forms.
Workshops
Let’s Make a Mural: From Drawing to Pavement Chalk to Painting the Walls
Leslie Perrino is an artist and “art evangelist” who loves to share the power of art and creativity with people, particularly in her beloved areas of metals and enameling. Her artwork is a quirky mix of traditional and found objects, most recently combining computer/electrical components with enamels. She is a charismatic and effective teacher who encourages skill building and exploration of the medium.
Workshops
Kristin Peterson is a third generation artist, originally from South Dakota. Kristin’s creative passion is inspired and supported by her husband and kids, all whom encourage, critique, and promote her work.
Kristin is always exploring and expanding the creative depths of being an artist. She very much enjoys vintage collage work and mixed media. Kristin loves color and things that have a love-worn comfortable feeling-like an old favorite pair of jeans-coffee stained, patched, painted and well loved. She wants her art to project feeling and make people feel good while looking at it. Her style contains vibrance mixed with a little funk, which is sprinkled with discreet sensibility.
Workshops
Kathryn is an educator and textile artist. She started sewing her own clothes as a quest to remove plastic from her wardrobe, and now she uses historical and couture techniques to create garments that blend artistic form with practical function.
Workshops
Sarah Rehmer was born and raised in the western suburbs of Chicago, where she still resides. In 2003 Rehmer earned her BA in Graphic Design and Photography from Dominican University in River Forest, IL. She found her love for working with pages from old books while auditing a class post-graduation at the university. Rehmer is an Illinois Arts Council – Professional Development Grant recipient and her work is held in private collections both around the United States and internationally, as well as Institutional and Corporate collections in Illinois and New York. Rehmer teaches classes and workshops around the Midwest.
Workshops
Lorraine Reynolds is a multidisciplinary artist specializing in the transformation of recycled materials. She works primarily in fiber, collage, assemblage and installation. Her creative practice is deeply rooted in an intimate connection with the local environment, utilizing materials gifted by her surroundings. Through her art, she reveres the legacies of the past, seeking to nourish our collective spirits and find meaning within the ceaseless cycles of existence ‚Äì embracing both life’s vitality and its poignant transitions. Believing in the profound potential of art, Lorraine sees it as a catalyst for healing, guiding both creator and observer through the realms of loss and trauma, offering a passage toward solace and understanding.
With over 30 years’ expertise in the apparel industry, Lorraine’s passion for textiles and vintage apparel fuels her artistic expression. Alongside her studio practice and teaching engagements, she works full-time as a Design and Product Development Consultant.
Lorraine earned her MFA in Visual Art from Vermont College of Fine Art and has showcased her work both regionally and nationally. Her commitment to the arts extends to her community involvement, having contributed to the board of Shake Rag Alley Center for the Arts as a past president.
She resides in Mineral Point, WI with her husband and her extremely affectionate German Shorthair Pointer, Ziggy.
Workshops
Mending Hearts: Stitching Recycled Fibers Into Sculpture
Sustainable Fashion: Introduction to Altered Apparel and Visible Mending
Regina Riley taught herself to coil pine needle baskets 21 years ago. Since then she has always had a needle and thread in her hands. Coiling is just another form of sewing. She encourages students to use other natural materials, which is another reason for her enjoyment of this form of basketry. She has taught in Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, and Missouri. Her latest interest in basketry is the Cherokee Double Wall style and the Oklahoma Cherokee Double Wall style. One of her first pine needle baskets is in the permanent collection at the Rountree Gallery in Platteville, Wisconsin.
Workshops
I now live in a small town of Hopkinton, Iowa. Spent most of my adult life taking all kinds of craft classes. The ones I enjoyed I practiced a lot so I could master them. Some of the crafts I really enjoyed most include carving, knitting, tatting, Hedebo, papercutting and Zentangle. I try to incorporate some of the crafts together. I have really enjoyed putting Zentangle on carvings. When people see them, they ask me to teach classes. I really enjoy passing along the craft to others.
Workshops
Bob Ristow has been interested in Shaker Oval Boxes ever since he visited the Canterbury Shake Village in New Hampshire. To advance his knowledge in box making, he attended several classes taught by John Wilson at the Home Shop in Charlotte, MI. Since then, Bob has demonstrated these procedures at several woodcarving clubs in IA, MN as well as at a number of rustic retreats as far away as Montana. He is always experimenting with different woods, shapes, and sizes to make these boxes. His other interests include woodcarving, wood turning, winemaking and fiber arts.
Workshops
18 Shake Rag St.
Mineral Point, WI 53565
(608) 987-3292
