ABOUT
Who is the Art Mines
The Art Mines is a turnkey art service based in Austin, TX, providing a complete design-to-installation solution or just fabrication, depending on your needs. Their strength is in their flexibility and the experience that enables it, allowing large and small orders across a wide range of technologies and mediums.
The Art Mines is an art duo of Mary and Dave, working from their studios in Austin, TX. Their specialty is giving you the best quality, with consistency and with an easy interface. Mary and Dave can do this because of the breadth and depth of expertise they bring from fine art oils and large scale prop making to commercial manufacturing technology. That’s why they are equally at home with a single one-off piece or an order of 180 pieces.
Mary Wendel
Co-Founder, Artist, Fabricator
Mary is originally from the San Antonio area and moved to Austin in 2012. In her personal work, Mary's focus is on representational figurative oil painting. She has been a professional artist for most of her life, selling her first oil painting in a show at age 14. She shows her work all around Austin now and won Best in Show at the 2018 Georgetown Art Hop Juried exhibition in Georgetown, TX.
In addition to being classically trained in oils, Mary also has a background as a scenic artist working on theatrical sets, backdrops, and props. She taught Acrylic Art classes for 8 years and has hosted oil and charcoal workshops for schools and collectives.
All of her combined experience and skills are the perfect mix for The Art Mines, making all types of art full time.
Dave Threlkeld
Co-Founder, Maker, Fabricator
Dave started out as a blacksmith in the Dallas/Fort Worth area and his career found a winding path through fabrication, construction and then managing projects in manufacturing and software development. He was the lead prototype maker for an engineering lab doing R&D for the Department of Defense, basically making and testing inventions in a mad science laboratory which is surprisingly similar to making sculptures to order.
He has used a wide variety of technologies and is passionate about learning new processes whenever possible. Although starting in metalworking, he has shifted his focus into fine woodworking, making fine art furniture and is branching into software, composites and robotics. The sky is the limit as to what can be made!
When not making things for rocket scientists he plays bari sax with rocket scientists as part of the Minor Mishap Marching Band in Austin, TX, and makes props, costumes and prototypes for fun.
