Mourners, memorabilia reflect colorful life of art teacher

Memorabilia of Terri Werner graced the top of her casket at the Gaffney Funeral Home, where scores of family, friends, and students gathered in Medford to grieve for the slain art teacher. (Justine Hunt/Globe Staff)

MEDFORD - To the right of Terri Werner's casket stood a small sculpture, all angles and rippled surfaces, which she created to be touched as much as viewed. Leaning against a floral arrangement on the opposite end was an abstract painting by one of her visually impaired art students, its yellow background peeking through a swirl of bold brushstrokes in a rainbow of colors.

Reminders of the spectrum of hues that made up Werner's life filled the chapel this weekend at the Gaffey Funeral Home in Medford. She was a teacher of the blind, a spouse, daughter, sister, and aunt, an artist and musician who was handy with tools and deft at training dogs. Atop the casket sat Werner's cowboy hat and boots, alongside a photo taken of her last year at a rodeo in Oregon.

And everywhere were photos of her with Mary Clark, whom she married in 2005, several years after they met while working in Watertown at the Perkins School for the Blind.

"Terri was a strong, strong person. She didn't doubt," Clark said yesterday, the morning after scores of students, colleagues, and friends gathered at the funeral home to grieve and quietly wrestle anew with a death difficult to fathom.

An attentive and indefatigable teacher, Werner died Tuesday, stabbed and beaten at the Brighton home of her former student Luis Marquez, who was charged with killing Werner. Police say she had visited Marquez to lend emotional support as he dealt with bipolar disorder and depression.

While acknowledging the emotional trauma of her death, the Rev. Patricia Tummino reminded those at Saturday's memorial service that "Terri was not one to let darkness have the last word." So instead, laughter filled the room and eyes grew moist as friends shared stories about Werner's life of adventures.

"She had a mind of her own," Merilyn Werner of Marysville, Wash., said of her daughter. "She would say, 'You don't say "I can't" - not until you can say, "I've tried." ' That was her philosophy."

Terri Werner grew up in Marysville with her brothers, Larri and Gary, who still live in Washington. She raised and bred German shepherds in Yakima, Wash., before moving to the Boston area, where she studied at the Massachusetts College of Art. After beginning work at the Perkins School in the 1990s, she received a master's in education from Lesley University.

"If you think about teaching art to blind students, it sounds like an oxymoron," said Steven Rothstein, president of the Perkins School. "She believed that our students had the opportunity and the right to learn about tactile art."

Some did more than simply learn. Werner worked with the Museum of Fine Arts to display her students' creations "in the same building with Monet and Homer and world-class artists," Rothstein said. "Our students were there because of Terri."

Though she could help the sightless see to create by guiding their hands and imaginations, Werner was as comfortable with a hammer as she was with a paintbrush.

"Terri was a jack-of-all-trades," said her father-in-law, Herbert J. Clark, whose Medford house benefited from her carpentry.

And despite her energy, Werner "had this calming effect to her," said her nephew Patrick McCarthy of Braintree. "She just brought everything down a key and made everyone relax."

Clark and Werner, who were born two days apart 56 years ago, hosted their nieces and nephews at the Middleborough home they shared with two horses, two German shepherds, and a cat. Werner taught the children to ride horses, built birdhouses with them, made hot chocolate with a dollop of vanilla ice cream, and most importantly listened to whatever they had to say.

"You always felt really accepted," said her niece Hannah McCarthy of Braintree.

For Werner's students, such acceptance meant working with a teacher who could look beyond their lack of sight.

"She treated us all normally," said Marybeth, a Perkins School student who spoke at the service.

"She was so full of love and had such a huge heart," Clark said yesterday, as she recalled going through Werner's Palm Pilot the night she died, looking for phone numbers of people to notify.

The next morning, Clark picked up the Palm Pilot "and it opened to a note to herself: 'Remember to love Mary always and to pay attention to her every day.' That's how she lived, and I wish I could have her back. . . . But I have to get used to not having her here, and I know I have to learn from her how to be a stronger person. I can feel it in my bones, that's what she's telling me: 'Now you do it.' "