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B.B. King
Commission Miz Thang to create an art piece of your favorite Blues musician or song.
read moreGet Your Rock On
This is a custom piece for a musician. Get your rock on and get a custom art piece for your favorite musician.
read moreArt Awards
Miz Thang will create customized art work for you. This was an award for a fishing tournament. Wouldn’t you like to get an award like this?
read moreCustom Art – A Creation Just For You
Miz Thang creates custom art work just for you. Whether you would like an art piece of your pet, favorite band, child in band, family, etc…. Miz Thang will create a special art piece just for you. Go to the contact page and tell her what kind of art piece you would like. Be sure to include the specifics that you want with your email address and phone number.
read moreOutsider Art Comes In
Born in Arizona and raised in California, Futerer grew up in an artistic family and pursued a modeling career in Manhattan with the Ford Modeling Agency. When she began looking around the art world, though, she wasn’t drawn to the classical forms, but to the rawness of outsider art, a genre of art created by untrained or self-taught artists. She started first buying the works of a single artist, but as her knowledge of the genre grew, so did the number of artists whose works lined her walls. “I started collecting outsider art like a fiend and it took over my house so I decided to open a museum and to share it because I wasn’t willing to part with it,” she said. When she finally had the opportunity to meet with some of the artists, she found that they were willing to let her sell their works. So six years ago she opened an art gallery, The Outsiders Gallery, in Litchfield.–photo1L– She later tired of paying rent and closed that gallery to operate exclusively over the Internet. But now, having found a suitable space in Cornwall Bridge, Futerer is preparing to give The Outsiders Art Gallery a physical presence once again. The gallery will reopen at its new Cornwall Bridge location Saturday.May 15. Her new gallery is in a 2,400-square-foot space attached to the home she shares with her fiance, Dana Gingras, a steel and glass artist she met when he showed in her previous gallery. Several of Gingras’ works will be displayed at the gallery opening and he plans on offering glass blowing demonstrations at a later date. The space formerly housed an antique shop, but had fallen into some disrepair. “What they started with was beautiful and great, but we had to bring it back,” said Futerer. It is now a simple space with wooden floors, its walls and ceiling beams painted white. It is the perfect backdrop to the art, which ranges from the fanciful to the downright scary. On the one hand are the sculptures of bronze and wood artist Armand Saiia. Outside the gallery – in a space which will become a sculpture garden – one of Saiia’s sculptures, a ladder-like series of bone-like forms cast in bronze, hangs from a chain attached to the branch of a tree. Inside, two of his carved wooden torsos are bound in chains. On the lighter side are wire animal sculptures created by Alec Wirth, Futerer’s 12-year old son. Wirth, a seventh-grader at St. Margaret’s-McTernan School in Waterbury, takes single strands of wire and twists them into animal shapes. Even at his age, Wirth has sold several pieces of his work and even had a hand in finding another of the artists taking part in the gallery opening – his teacher, Russell Brockmann. Brockmann, who chairs the school’s middle and upper school art department, is a painter and sculptor. Futerer learned of him when Wirth brought home some images of his work that he had shared in school. “He has these huge pieces and they’re beautiful. The only place he’s shown is Vogue magazine because his wife works there and he was able to hang them in her office,” Futerer said. The gallery’s opening show will run until the end of June. After that, Futerer plans...
read moreFolk Art Jubilee
Folk Art Jubilee Self-taught artists and their fans mingle each fall at Alabama’s up close and personal Kentuck Festival By Brian Noyes Smithsonian magazine, October 2003 Under the towering pines hard by Alabama’s Black Warrior River, the talk at 8 a.m. on an October Saturday is of a forecast of rain. When the exhibited work of 38 folk artists is made of mud, cardboard, sticks and rags—and the exhibit is out-of-doors—wet weather can indeed mean a washout. But for now the sun shines, merciful news for the 30,000 people expected today and tomorrow at the Kentuck Festival of the Arts, held the third weekend of every October in the woods near downtown Northport, across the river from Tuscaloosa. Here is America’s folk art at its most personal, a unique event where nationally acclaimed self-taught and primitive artists create, show and sell their work themselves. To see these “roots artists” otherwise would, in many cases, involve road trips through the backwoods and hollows of Alabama, Georgia and the Carolinas. Over its 32-year history, the show has taken on the homey atmosphere of a family reunion, with many buyers returning year after year to chat with the artists and add to their collections. (I am one of those fans; over the years, I’ve collected work by some of the artists featured on these pages.) At the entrance to the festival, Sam McMillan, a 77-year-old artist from Winston-Salem, North Carolina, holds court, resplendent in a polka-dot daubed suit that matches the painted furniture, lamps and birdhouses for sale behind him. “People walk in and catch a sight of me and think, ‘Whoa now, what’s happening at this place today?’” says McMillan. “They know they’re in for something different.’’ Kentuck is the most intimate event of its kind in the nation, says Ginger Young, a visitor and art dealer in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. “For many of us, art encounters consist of hushed museum exhibitions and pretentious gallery openings,” she says. “Kentuck is unrivaled in its ability to blaze a direct connection between artists and art fans. What happens at Kentuck is akin to a good old-fashioned Southern revival.” Kentuck (it’s named for an early settlement on the site of the present-day town; the origin of the word is unclear) began in 1971 as an offshoot of Northport’s centennial celebration. That first festival, says founding director Georgine Clarke, featured only 20 artists; two years later there were 35. “We quickly outgrew the downtown location and had our eyes on an overgrown park a little ways out of town,” she says. “Postmaster Ellis Teer and I walked around it to figure out how much of it we could mow—Ellis brought his lawn mower along—and that became the area we’d set up in. Each year we mowed a little bit more, and the festival grew that much.” The exhibition now covers half of the 38.5-acre park and showcases more than 200 traditional craftspeople quilting, forging metal, weaving baskets, making furniture and throwing pottery. But the big draw remains the extraordinary collection of authentic folk artists, each with stories to tell about how they started and where they get their inspiration. Many of the artists now have works in the permanent collections of museums like the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Baltimore’s AmericanVisionaryArt Museum and the New...
read moreMiz Thang
Written by M Glover Thursday, 04 November 2010 Another year at the Ketuck festival, and I had another artist to choose. With so many talented, unique artists to choose from, it can be quite the challenge to find only one to interview. This year, choosing an artist was not a difficult task for me. Not when you scroll on the list of artists and find a name that captures your attention like Miz Thang. “Just let me know if I can help you,” Miz Thang would say when anyone came walking into her bright, colorful, musical tent at the Kentuck Festival of the Arts. Wearing her paint-covered overalls, pink t-shirt, and shades, Miz Thang definitely had it going on! Painter, woodworker, and lover of blues music, Miz Thang has been interested in Folk Art since the 1970s. One of her sources of inspiration is Howard Finster, who is credited as The Father of Folk Art. Ever since she was a young girl, Miz Thang has always done things with her hands, whether it was drawing or modeling with clay, art has always been a part of her life. Miz Thang, like her name implies, is a unique individual. She is a self-taught folk artist from Hawkinsville, Georgia. What others may consider junk Miz Thang considers art and finds the beauty in it. Miz Thang’s first piece was of one of her favorite blues artists, John Lee Hooker. When she started carving this figure and painting she was “in the mood.” Usually, her work is inspired by whomever she is listening to. When making her art more “soulful,” Miz Thang is not afraid to dip her fingers in the paint. “99% of the time, I use my fingers. Every now and then, I may use a brush. I like feeling the paint. When I feel the paint, I feel like I’m putting my own mojo in the artwork.” She enjoys hearing the sound of laughter and messages in her artworks that are positive and funny help to stir the sound. All of her work displays a message and the mood she was in while creating the piece can be seen. Miz Thang’s work was first made public in the 1990s. In the early 2000s, she was recognized for some of her pieces of art. “It makes you feel good, validated, and it’s nice that someone took the time to appreciate your work.” Some of her artwork can be found in homes, in museums, and featured in art shows. Her work has caused her to travel far. She has traveled to art shows located in Georgia, to Florida, to Kentucky, even to Switzerland showcasing her love for the blues, folk art, and creativity to those willing to accept her genius. Miz Thang is always on the go — she is a high school special education teacher in Georgia. Sometimes, she decorates her classroom with some of her artwork and her students enjoy it. She even allows her students to call her Miz Thang. In her spare time, which is after school hours, weekends, and holidays are dedicated to creating art. “I don’t mind it. It’s relaxing to me.” The main and best shows that Miz Thang takes the time out to participate in are Kentuck and the Fairrington Arts Festival....
read moreMiz Thang, the Artist of the Blues: History of the Blues Through Art
The songs slaves and field workers sang as they worked on Southern plantations in America in the 19th century and later after the end of slavery in the early 20th century, evolved over the years into what has become the Blues. The earliest Blues were mostly sad songs about hard work, unhappy love affairs and being poor, but songs about happier times eventually came to be included. At first, Blues were sung and played only by African-Americans, but now Blues music has spread around the world and is performed by all nationalities and races. Blues gave birth to most other kinds of American popular music, including Jazz, Rock & Roll, Zydeco, Rhythm & Blues and others. Miz Thang chronicles the history of the blues in her art. Over the years, she has created at least 3,500 art depictions of the blues greats, some of whom are listed below. Blind Willie McTell Ma Rainey Memphis Minnis W.C. Handy Stevie Ray Vaughan Bessie Smith Muddy Waters Billie Holiday John Lee Hooker Howlin Wolf B.B. King Etta James Robert Johnson Sonny Boy Williamson R.L. Burnside Otis Taylor Sippie Wallace Lucille Bogan Rev. Pearley Brown Elvis Big Mama Thornton Lightnin Hopkins Frankie Half Pint Jaxon Coots Grant Sox Wilson Ida Cox Sara Martin Victoria Spivey Sister Rosetta Tharpe Bertha Chippie Hill Mamie Smith Bessie Tucker Alberta Hunter Trixie Smith Clara Smith Son House Skip James Tommy Johnson Mississippi Fred McDowell Charlie Patton Bukka White Ishman Bracey Big Bog Crudup Johnny Shines Robert Lockwood Tommy McClennan Sunnyland Slim Geechie Temple Son Terry Brownine McGhee Blind Blake Alabama Shieks Gus Cannon Bo Carter...
read moreMiz Thang and The Alabama Blues Project
The Alabama Blues Project (ABP), based in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, has been called “a unique program that helps children find harmony and hope.” The ABP us a nonprofit group dedicated to educating the public about blues music and the vital role that Alabama Musicians from W.C. Handy to Dinah Washington have played in its evolution. Once a week in the spring, the ABP runs an after-school program known as Blues Camp. The camp is also presented as an intensive weeklong session in the summer. Since its inception in 1995, the camp and other programs have reached more than 100,000 children. Seventy-two percent of the campers are considered at-risk because of poverty or special needs. For the majority of them, the chance to express themselves through music is an incredibly liberating way to deal with behavioral issues or horrific family environments. The ABP blues camp is a lifeline for the children whatever their background. Miz Thang has been a guest artist at the Alabama Blues Camp for the past five years, leading children in art projects that honor Alabama blues greats. She always comes up with highly unusual projects that capture the kids’ imaginations and encourage them to express themselves creatively. For example, at Blues Camp, the group made cigar box guitars and shakarees out of gourds. But in 2008 Mix Thang contributed much more to the Project than her time and artistic skills. She donated the Blues Door, which chronicles hundreds of blues greats from Alabama. The Blues Door includes a written and pictorial history of Alabama Blues. Using extensive research Miz Thing crafted the door with cut outs made from cabinet grade birch. The Blues Door is currently on display at the Alabama Blues Project and is seen below displayed at the Alabama Blues Project Blues Camp. The children and teens at Blues Camp love Miz Thang and she loves helping them release their creativity. Miz Thang is available to lead group art classes and projects for children and teen-agers. Email her to set up an art program for your group. ...
read moreMiz Thang’s Art
