Autry National Center

Margery Torrey

http://theautry.org/masters-of-the-american-west-2011/richard-d-thomas http://theautry.org/masters-of-the-american-west-2011/kent-ullberg

Margery Torrey began sculpting as a child in New York. Shaping forms was an activity that went hand-in-hand with her love of the outdoors and its wildlife. She would roam the family farm on Long Island's north shore, dig clay from the banks of the pond, and create sculptures of the ducks, turtles, and anything else that wandered by. Sculpting from her field studies has been a theme in her work ever since.

Torrey began her formal training at the Paul Mellon Arts Center at Choate/Rosemary Hall in Wallingford, Connecticut, and went on to study at Wellesley College where she earned a degree in applied art and art history. She completed additonal study at the Parsons School of Design in New York and spent a year in Florence, Italy, and Spain studying Renaissance scupture and studio work with contemporary sculptors. She then moved to Wyoming and apprenticed for two and a half years with a German taxidermist to learn "animal architecture" from the inside out. In 1983 she opened her own studio in Jackson, Wyoming, and subsequenlty cast her first bronze in 1987. She began sculpting the human figure as well, creating mannequins for Victoria's Secret and the Limited Corporation.

Torrey is a Signature Member of the Society of Animal Artists. Her work has been shown at the National Museum of Wildlife Art, Leigh Yawkey Woodson Museum's Birds in Art show, and she has had one-person shows at Callaway Gardens, Georgia, and Somerville Manning Gallery in Delaware. In 1998, AFLAC commissioned Torrey to sculpt their "Spokes-duck" for display in AFLAC offices worldwide. She has been featured in Maxim magazine and Southwest Art. Her work is collected internationally and is in many public and private collections.

Margery Torrey is represented by Simpson Gallagher Gallery, Cody, Wyoming.