By the time Dolores Valenza began to pursue her love of art in about 1960, she and husband Larry already had 2 of their 4 children. Her first teacher was to be Pascal Rocco, a local Gallery owner and framer who also a very well trained and talented artist. Finding Dolores an apt pupil, Pascal Rocco eventually advised her to go to the Brooklyn Museum Art School for further training in a formal school setting. At Brooklyn Museum Art School, Dolores studied under Isaac Soyer among others. Her hard work paid off when four of the works Dolores created at the Museum School went into an exhibition at Pascal Rocco's Gallery. One of these early works sold! This was great encouragement -- truly a thrill for a budding artist!
Art calls to art. A trip with friends to see the Mona Lisa at a traveling exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, lead to lunch at a restaurant one block down from the Museum that happened to exhibit paintings. Dolores bravely asked if they'd exhibit her works, too. They would! And her paintings sold off the wall, again and again, for several years. Many became wonderful additions to fine collections.

Text by Molley McManus-Muldrow