About Us

Outside the Lines Art Gallery was created by Connie Twining and Stormy Mochal.

"I saw Stormy’s artwork before I actually met her,” Twining said. “I was a parent volunteer at the Nativity School, and they had a mentor/mentee relationship with Loras College. Stormy had her senior show at Loras prior to graduation. The art chair, Tom Jewell-Vitale, suggested that I bring the children from the Nativity School over to see it as it was a colorful, joyful collection. Shortly afterwards, Stormy and I met when she did a show at the Rocco Buda Arts and Resource Center, where I served as chair of the gallery.”

After graduating from Loras with a degree in painting and art history, Mochal was an AmeriCorps member for two years, serving at St. Mark’s Community Center, Lincoln Elementary School and Carnegie-Stout Public Library. After the AmeriCorps term ended, she worked part time at the library and was a cocktail waitress at The Lift.

“I started to participate in juried art fairs in Iowa, Illinois and Wisconsin and sold at a few galleries in the tri-states area,” Mochal said. “I also taught art classes, often working three jobs at once."

Twining, a Marine Corps spouse, traveled around the country and spent time in Japan.

“When my husband retired from the Marine Corps in 1994, we returned to Dubuque to be closer to family,” she said. “While my husband was in the Marine Corps, I spent a lot of time volunteering for a number of organizations including our children’s schools, humane societies, a thrift shop, gift shop, as an art auction coordinator and as the chair of the Rocco Buda Gallery, a nonprofit art gallery.”

Mochal was four years out of college when she decided that she wanted to open a brick-and-mortar art gallery with the goal to help artists blossom and sustain themselves.

“I called Connie in 2003 to brainstorm some ideas, and by the end of the conversation, I asked her if she would be my business partner,” Mochal said.

The first Outside the Lines Dubuque location opened in November 2003 in a tiny space that adjoined a coffee shop and an even smaller pottery gallery.

 

For many years, we called 409 Bluff Street in Dubuque our home.

409 Bluff Street

In July 2017 we moved to our current location at 1101 Main Street in Dubuque, Iowa.

Connie Twining, left, and Stormy Mochal accept an award on behalf of Outside the Lines Art Gallery for The Great Draw Street Art Competition during the Dubuque Main Street Ltd's annual awards.

In April 2014 we opened a second gallery at 101 S. Main Street in Galena, Illinois.