WESLEY CHAPEL, Fla. — The Dunedin Fine Art Center offers adult art classes for those seeking to hone their craft skills.

What You Need To Know

  • Dunedin Fine Art Center offers adult art classes starting Jan. 8 

  • Classes offered by the center can include ceramics, weaving, painting, carving

  • The New Director of Adult education is an artist/teacher Deon Blackwell

  • Blackwell wants to make sure locals know about the DFAC- the classes and events

Deon Blackwell is a lifelong artist and teacher, and he is the new head of Adult Education at the Dunedin Fine Art Center.

He is pushing down on a lever of an apparatus, making a hollow clay tube in his Wesley Chapel workshop.

“Basically, if you ever had a Play-Doh fun factory, this is the equivalent for ceramics,” Blackwell said.

He gives huge props to the instructors.

“Those guys are crazy advanced over me,” Blackwell said. “I got my MFA, but those guys are writing literal books on clay processes, and they live right here in this area.”

And it’s not just clay, there are many other types of classes and skills offered.

“I got to go through the entire catalog and set all the classes,” he said.

There’s wood turning, stone carving, even Mayan backstrap weaving. Blackwell says art changes you.

“Oh yeah, I love this stuff,” Blackwell said, while working on his hollow clay creation. “I have to be careful. I’ll get lost building up here at times.”

Blackwell’s big message about art is don’t leave it behind in your childhood.

“We teach art, and we have lots of stuff in the school for art when we are young,” he said. “When we get older, we forget that it’s super beneficial to make something with your hands.”