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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.--photo2R-- 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 to rotate new
shows about every two
months. The gallery
also features works by
Howard Finster,
Missionary Mary Proctor,
Miz Thang,
R A Miller,
Jimmy Lee Sudduth
and other respected
outsider artists. |
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