By: Drennan Hayden/ Art Teacher

You know what Mr. Hayden loves? Getting his hands dirty.  Rolling up his sleeves.  Drilling holes in things. Before I became an art teacher I did a decent amount of work in the trades. So when Mr. Corbett told me he wanted an area to display student artwork I happily obliged. I scouted the school for the most prime piece of real estate, and found it down by the counseling offices. The first thing I did was take measurements and lay out in pencil where the gallery would be placed. I made sure to get everything centered, square and symmetrical so that when the job was done and I stepped back I didn’t have any crooked, sloppy work to soil my good name. Once I was measured out I taped the area off and painted it all with white primer. I chose white primer to mimic how major art galleries prep their space for shows. After two coats of primer I was ready to install the aluminum track that the work gets hung from. I custom cut the aluminum tracks to match the the length of the white space exactly. I marked all the holes and ran a pilot bit, then a 5/16th bit. I tapped plastic anchors (necessary when there is no stud) in with a hammer and then screwed the tracks into place.  After everything was set and installed I came up with a sleek little logo , made a stencil, and spray painted the design onto the wall. It was a good time.