Shakespeare's Fulcrum Gallery Dinner (9:03)

Description: "The dogs have gone to the art?" "Hilarious" and bubbly Kate Rigg is our guide to "A Big New York Gallery Opening" where we are guests of charming gallery owner, exhibitionist - Valerie Shakespeare (who claims to be related to the original William Shakespeare) and her fascinating and magnetic husband, actualist artist - "That's The Art Part"-Tery Fugate-Wilcox. An odd, unusual and often delightful evening at Shakespeare's Fulcrum Gallery in Soho, reminds me of how much I love being a New Yorker. Kate brilliantly guides us through an evening of "Art and Conversation", exhibitionism and local color and then finally "pops" the very serious question... "Do I smell like Dick"? "Shakespeare's Fvlcrvm Dinners - Fvlcrvm gallery began, like all other galleries, having "regular" openings with tiny cups of white wine. But being raised in Arizona, Shakespeare's sense of hospitality moved her to offer food as well. After a particularly crowded opening, for which she had cooked all day, she noticed the neither she, nor none of her artists, staff or collectors had gotten anything to eat. As she sat in a restaurant, buying dinner for over 30 people, she wondered, "What's wrong with this picture?" So began her signature sit-down dinners every week, for friends and supporters of Actual Art.[21] In 1997, Fvlcrvm Gallery moved to a two-level space, complete with outdoor sculpture garden for art to weather, and a firepole, at 480 Broome Street, in SoHo. This gallery was also artist-designed, by Tery Fugate-Wilcox. The gallery continued at the Broome Street location, where the installation of a full kitchen permitted the gallery's weekly sit-down dinners to be expanded for 35 to 45 people and the occasional buffet party for hundreds, including the dinner party for Chinese New Year, with art by Tery Fugate-Wilcox, that was blown up on the street, complete with fireworks and a dragon for the celebration, during a ban by Mayor Rudy Giuliani on explosives,[22] and a Nude Portrait Marathon with Barneby Ruhe making conventional paintings of nude models, while Tery Fugate-Wilcox had living nudes standing in huge frames on the walls of the gallery. Some of the most notable works at the new location included: a glass behive, by Robert DuGrenier;[23] a 55 gallon glass tank of water that grew slime & algae, by Tery Fugate-Wilcox;[24] steel drawings made by rusting etched steel plates in a studio under the sea.[25] There, the gallery became well known in the art-world, for its sit-down dinner parties, every Tuesday night, which Shakespeare cooked herself and served on an ever-expanding long table, down the center of the gallery.[26] The dinners were "intimate affairs for forty or fifty people",[27] including such celebrity guests as Michael Kennedy, Mary McFadden, Robert De Niro, Robert Goulet, Eric Douglas,[28] John De Lorean, John Kennedy and his wife, Caroline, many of whom bought art, supported the gallery or just loved to "hang out".[27]" - Wikipedia I hope you enjoy this really special evening and of course, "THE ART ON THE WALLS"! Has art gone to the dogs? What do you think? Richard Currier PS: Valerie & Tery, thank you for your generous spirit in bringing so many people together. Sadly, Valerie Monroe Shakespeare died on May 18th, 2011. Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulcrum_Gallery Produced & Directed by Richard Currier. (Excerpt/Clips) © 2012 If I Were, LLC