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Thom Wheeler’s career began many years ago in Houston where he worked primarily in stone and wood. Under the encouragement of collectors he began combining wood with metal to create monumental size sculptures. Early in his career, Wheeler’s primary focus was on commissions all over the United States.  He worked with designers and architects on large scale projects and his sculptures were used to embellish restaurants, hotels, offices and yachts. The scale of his work allowed him more space to interpret the feeling his clients wanted to convey. He continues to enjoy this area of creativity and recently completed two donor walls for hospitals in Taos, New Mexico and Fort Worth, Texas.

Wheeler moved to Taos in 1985 where he began concentrating on smaller pieces with icons of the West and Southwest - gypsy women, crosses, bucking broncos, howling coyotes, cow skulls, and the saguaro cacti. His “Wall Jewelry” is created with aluminum, bronze and copper embellished with a variety of semi-precious stones, found rocks or caste glass that resemble giant pieces of jewelry. Wheeler completed his foundry in 2003 and has rapidly developed his own style of sand casting. He now incorporates these dimensional pieces into many areas of his work.

Wheeler has gained recognition for his religious themed art. His knowledge and fascination with history and a variety of religions have taken him in various directions.  He enjoys mixing Southwest motifs and Native American beliefs with those of other religions to cast a more modern approach on how we view religion in our lives. A Celtic cross can have a Zuni bear embedded in the middle, or a butterfly might flutter onto a Star of David to accentuate the idea that “anything is possible.”