Rachel Collins had the good fortune to grow up in a home where art mattered, as her mother taught oil painting, design and composition. She found her own vocation in the visual arts after a first profession in the field of libraries, archives, and museums, using those skills at the Baha’i World Centre in Haifa, Israel from 1977 to 1990. A couple years later, she had the opportunity to do a series of scientific drawings of parts of very tiny moths, which entailed microscope work at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC. This piqued her interest in a close-up viewpoint, which in turn has influenced her work in fine art, as much of her work features a close-focus look at her subjects, whether natural or man-made. Her watercolor paintings have earned recognition and awards on the regional and national level in the U.S., and have won her signature status in the U.S. National Watercolor Society. In the Washington area, she works regularly in her studio at the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Alexandria, Virginia, where over 150 artists in 82 studios welcome visitors every day to view and discuss the process of making art. She teaches watercolor classes and workshops at The Art League School, also in Alexandria, as well as elsewhere in the U.S. and abroad.
