The KCAM Art Car Initiative

A car arrives. A year later, it leaves as something else.

On October 17, 2026, a trailer pulls up to Manual Career & Technical Center and a 1993 Chevrolet Corvette C4 rolls out onto the lot. It is not finished, and it is not meant to be. Over the school year that follows, students will take it from where it sits that morning to something Kansas City has not seen before.

That is the Kansas City Automotive Museum Art Car program: students, educators, designers, fabricators and automotive professionals in one shop, turning a real vehicle into work that leaves the building.

Students decide. They do not just execute.

Most school projects hand you a drawing and ask you to build it. This one does not.

Manual Tech students carry the Corvette through research, creative direction, concept development, refinement, and the physical build. They sit inside the decisions that shape the car: how an idea gets researched, how it gets argued for, how it survives a deadline and a budget, and how it finally becomes something you can walk around.

Manual Tech's technical education supplies the skill. Working professionals supply the standard.

Art Car before image; 1993 Corvette C4

Who is in the shop?

Pendulum is partnering with KCAM and Kansas City Public Schools to lead creative direction, design mentorship, project identity, communications and coordination for this year's Art Car.

Manual Tech’s faculty and students work alongside Pendulum and a wider network of automotive mentors, fabricators, sponsors and community partners, who come into the shop as the build calls for their expertise.

The Year Ahead

October 17, 2026. The Corvette arrives at Manual with donated parts. The build begins.

Through the school year. Fabrication, performance upgrades, exterior and interior work, detailing, final refinement.

April 2027. The completed Art Car is revealed publicly at Manual, then moves out into automotive events, exhibitions and appearances across the community.

What the students leave with:

The Corvette is only half of it. They leave having built a public project as a team, having worked beside professionals in their field, and having followed something they helped decide the whole distance from an idea to a finished object other people travel to see.

The car gets a reveal. The students get a track record.

Be Part of it.

Come on October 17. The Corvette arrives at Manual Tech and the year begins in public. Bring people.

We’ll have the Art Car alongside a lineup of cars from around Kansas City, cold brew, project partners, and a first look at some of the parts going into the build. At noon, the Corvette heads into the Manual automotive shop.

Saturday, October 17, 2026
10 AM–12 PM
Manual Career & Technical Center

BRING A CAR

Have something you’d like to show? Register your vehicle to be part of the morning’s lineup. Space is limited.

Sponsor the build. Parts, materials, services or funding. Sponsors are credited on the car, at the April reveal, and everywhere the Art Car appears afterward.

Mentor in the shop. Design, fabrication, paint, performance, upholstery, photography, media. A few hours in front of these students is worth more than you think.

Back the reveal. April 2027 is when this car meets the city. Lead sponsorship is open now. Reach out to join the team.