Mission: To foster and nurture creative, artistic development and personal growth through high quality art instruction for all ages, abilities, and backgrounds along the Wasatch front.
Target demographics: young children, teenagers and adults in their creative and artistic journeys
Direct beneficiaries per year: over 2,300 individuals
Geographic areas served: Salt Lake County
Programs: Visual Art Institute (VAI) is one of the oldest art afterschool programs in Utah. Our mission is to foster and nurture creative, artistic development and personal growth through high quality art instruction for all ages, abilities, and backgrounds along the Wasatch front.
Located centrally in Salt Lake City, with satellite locations in Utah County and outreach efforts across the region, we have cultivated a broad array of programming for K-12 students and adults, which focus on skill building and formal art education objectives and training. We believe in allowing students to develop and refine personal goals and interests and encourage students to develop a lifelong relationship with art and the arts community. VAI is proud to reach over 3,200 students annually.
Many of our after-school art students earn local to national awards, receive scholarships, and admission into top universities and art schools. Their success is due in part to VAI's dedication to assist art students’ in developing life skills of problem solving, self-confidence, independent and critical thinking, and collaboration. Studies nationally show that arts education fosters higher academic gains and the investment in art enrichment leads to net positive gains reflected in higher graduation rates and matriculation in higher education.
My grandchildren love the art classes and ceramic classes at VAI! VAI really provides a safe and nurturing environment to experiment and learn. My daughter tells me that my granddaughters look forward to their classes every week. Plus, it's keeping my teenager off of her smart phone :-)
VAI provides high quality instruction and the art faculty are top notch!