Garden Path Studio, Memphis

Kristi Duckworth doesn't mind when her art gets stepped on. In fact, she encourages it, having composed sprawling mosaics for park pathways and sidewalks. These locations are a fitting canvas for her large-scale, nature-inspired work. Her second favorite place to put art, however, is in the hands of children.

Kristi hosts multiple afterschool programs and classes that arm kids with everything they need to make beautiful one-of-a-kind pieces. Her mosaic lessons teach students to sift through tiles and arrange them into photo frames, and her ceramics classes cover the basics of sculpting and using a pottery wheel without constantly honking its horn. She also runs Art Night, a supervised three-hour period of freeform creation. Anyone who stops by can practice their mosaic-building skills, painting strokes, or ceramics techniques with the available tools.