Beryl Cook
Biography
Eleanor Beryl Cook was born in 1926 at Epsom in Surrey. One of four sisters, Beryl was raised in Reading, Berkshire where she attended Kendrick School, and then went on to have a variety of jobs in Berkshire and London.
In 1946 she married and had a son. It was when showing him how to paint that she herself quite liked the thought of being an artist. She continued using various materials; painting on scraps of wood, fire screens and a breadboard! One of her early paintings is titled ‘Bowling Ladies’.
Beryl’s success came to the attention of Bernard Samuels of the Plymouth Art Centre and her first exhibition of seventy-five paintings was a sell out. The show resulted in a cover feature in the Sunday Times Magazine and exhibitions at the Whitechapel and Portal Galleries in London followed.
Popular acclaim has been accompanied by serious critical appreciation, most notably with the inclusion of her painting in the fifth Peter Moores exhibition at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool, where she was seen in the context of mainstream contemporary art, alongside Bridges Riley, Stanley Spencer and Victor Passmore.
Cook is represented in the galleries of Durham, Glasgow and Plymouth. The new Glasgow Museum of Modern Art has also recently purchased some of her original work, ensuring her a place in the annuls of British Art.
Beryl Cook Paintings Currently Available :-
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