B E A ' S   B I O

Bea was born in Brooklyn, NY, in April of 1927, and remained in the New York area until she was in her early twenties. Always an artist, she was accepted into the prestigious New York High School of Music and Art, where the length of her commute nearly equalled the length of her school day. She then attended The Art Student's League, for which she was awarded a series of three competitve scholarships. ("I felt like a real hot shot," she says now). She studied under and was mentored by Will Barnet, and supported herself with a series of odd jobs which included hand-painting buttons and running the elevator of what is now the Park Central Hotel. She left New York for Los Angeles in 1949, where she enrolled in Los Angeles City College. That is also where she met Jack, her husband and partner for the past 50 years. With four children before she was thirty, Bea struggled to get her Bachelor's degree, which she received in 1957. She had switched from an Art major to a Psychology major because the studio requirements of Art were too demanding for her growing family. Bea's committment to Early Childhood Education began with her involvement in the Tarzana Cooperative Preschool in the San Fernando Valley. She eventually became its Director, went on to receive her Masters degree, and taught Special Education classes for the Los Angeles Unified School District. In 1978 she founded Child and Family Services of Los Angeles, Inc. As its Executive Director for nearly 16 years, Bea's renown as an expert in Early Childhood Development grew around the world. She retired in 1994, and has since devoted time to her garden, her grandchildren, her three poodles, and her artwork. (She achieved the status of Master Gardener bestowed by the State of California in 1997). "One of my teachers at the Art Student's League told me that I could never consider myself an artist unless I always had a work in progress," Bea says now. "So, with that in mind, I have always, always had something on which I was working." She is, indeed, an artist. Although many of Bea's works have been juried and have received critical acclaim, the bulk of her paintings and prints reside happily in private collections around the United States. From Washington D.C to Washington State, most of Bea's works have gone from easel to someone's home. Bea works in several mediums; oil, acrylics, woodcuts. She has recently begun experimenting with new woodcut techniques and was inspired by the discovery of the Barens website. She loves communicating with her fellow printmakers, learning from them, and sharing with them. She is hoping to meet as many of them in person as she can.