Beryl Cook is one of Britain's most talented and amusing artists .Beryl's pictures feature women of all shapes and sizes enjoying themselves . Beryl Cook eventually left Kendrick School in Reading at the age of 15, where she went to an insurance office. She eventually married her next door neighbour from Reading, John Cook. They bought a pub for a year before John took a job in Southern Rhodesia with a motor company. Beryl bought their young son a box of watercolours, and when showing him how to use it, she decided that she herself quite enjoyed painting. John subsequently bought her a child's painting set for her birthday and it was with this that she produced her first significant work, a half-length portrait of a dark-skinned lady with a vacant expression and large drooping breasts. It was aptly named 'Hangover' by Beryl's husband and still hangs in their house today.

In 1964 Beryl Cook and her husband settled in Plymouth where Beryl ran a boarding house for holidaymakers on the seafront. Beryl had now been painting for a number of years, basing her pictures on her everyday observations of people around her. By 1975 she had amassed numerous paintings that covered the walls of their boarding house. A friend took away a dozen or so and sold them all for around 10 each. Beryl was delighted and quickly increased her production. Her success came to the attention of Bernard Samuels at the Plymouth Arts Centre who persuaded her to mount her first exhibition featuring 75 paintings. It was a sell out.

She then had two exhibitions in London. Her first book 'The Works' was published in 1978. Her paintings were then reproduced as greeting cards and limited edition prints and soon her work was being featured around the world, amusing devoted fans all over the world. Her prints include Dance Class, Women Running, Twins and Lunchtime in the Gardens

One of her paintings was included in the fifth Peter Moores exhibition at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool where she was seen in the context of mainstream contemporary art. The new Glasgow Museum of Modern Art has also recently purchased some of her original work. Beryl Cook continues to paint and publish limited edition prints and has recently moved from Plymouth to Bristol, to be near her family.