The South Dallas Cultural Center celebrates 25 years this month, and over on Art and Seek, Stephen Becker zeros in on the center’s education programs, including the Soul Children’s Theater. The trick of the center’s success, says director Vicki Meek, is that despite students’ particular interests in say singing or dance, they are made to participate in all artistic disciplines while at the center.

“One doesn’t learn to just be a painter, or to just be a dancer or a musician – one learns all of it. So my thought when we developed a curriculum for the summer arts at the center program was to let children understand that that is the African way.”

Desmond Blair grew up going to the center. Blair first attended as a 10-year-old interested in making comic books. But taking a sculpture class literally opened up a new dimension to him. He’s now a 24 year old developing 3D modeling animation techniques at the University of Texas at Dallas.