“I have a need to create. It’s not just what I do. It’s who I am.”

As a ‘Focus’ featured artist in “Western Art Collector’s” April 2012 issue, as well as having a piece displayed in a 2011 “American Art Collector” article on miniature works, Granbury, TX artist Rebecca Zook, is definitely an artist worth watching. She has several successful solo shows under her belt as well as many local and national level awards.

In 2011, she was granted Signature Status in the National Oil and Acrylic Painters Society. Only 120 artists have been given Signature Status in the organization’s 20-year history. “What was it that Dorothy learned…”If ever go looking for my heart’s desire again, I won’t look any further than my own back yard.”

 Many artists travel far and wide to find inspiration for their work, but I often find the most compelling scenes are truly in my own back yard, an empty lot just up the street, the dramatic clouds poised over the road toward home or one of my dogs curled up on the sofa sound asleep.

Rather than focusing on a specific subject matter, Rebecca relies on a high level of detail and a strong sense of light to tie her work together. Viewers often comment that they feel as if they could step into her paintings; as if the frame was a window to another world. Rebecca knew as a child she was going to be an artist and never strayed very far from that path. Her earliest memories are of spending hours at a time sitting at a table with paper and crayons drawing every animal imaginable.

Taking drawing and sculpture classes all through school, Rebecca was fortunate to attend a high school that offered Commercial Art as an elective (thank you Mr. Norton). This altered her path from fine art to Graphic Design. She received a full academic scholarship to Southern Methodist University in Dallas where she majored in Advertising Art gaining her BFA degree. She minored in fine art–taking photography, painting, printmaking and ceramics courses. She also took computer programming as an elective, unaware of how much this was going to help her years down the road when the World Wide Web came into the mainstream. Rebecca has been working as a Commercial Artist for the last 20 years.

Most recently for an in-house corporate agency as a Senior Graphic Designer. She turned her attention back to fine art in 2003, though still works a full-time day job. Rebecca has worked in many media, but has settled on painting in acrylics to express herself. In August 2008, she was diagnosed with a rare genetic immune disease called Hypogammaglobulemia or CVID that requires ongoing treatment with donated human plasma-based medication. Visit her website to learn more about this disease and how it impacts her. Competing for her time and attention are her bevy of “children” including: dogs, cats and parrots, as well as an avid love of gardening-concentrating on xeric and/or native plants. Rebecca recently married (on the day the world didn’t end 12/21/12) to a “scientist with the heart of an artist.”

Affiliations: Signature Member NOAPS (National Oil and Acrylic Painters Society) Signature Member “Daily Painters of Texas,” Artists of Texas Acrylic Artists Association LGAA (Lake Granbury Art Association)

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