The Daily Palette Vintage

MARIE C. COOK
Silhouettes by Marie #1, paper cuttings

Helen Marie Casey Cook was born in 1918, in Cedar Falls, Iowa. She graduated from the Iowa State Teachers College (now University of Northern Iowa) with a Kg-PRI certificate in 1938. Her specialties are watercolor painting and cut-paper silhouettes. She has done several commissioned paintings for local organizations and businesses. One of her favorite subjects is a large stone barn near Cedar Falls.

She writes: "It was in December of 1969 when my path crossed that of Lorene Rose Diehl from Waterloo and I began to cut silhouettes of people. It is basically a lot of practice and I have cut many. Some days I would do over one hundred. It takes four to five minutes and then there is the pasting on a 5X7 white card. In the first year or so I began cutting houses and finishing details in India Ink and diluted India ink."

This page was first published on October 12, 2004.

Update: Affectionately dubbed "Cedar Falls' treasure," Ms. Cook passed away in 2011.

Marie C. Cook's website