Rebecca Birtel Madura is a New Orleans born visual artist. Many of her colorful paintings represent our sometimes detached relationship with nature within an urban environment. Working in oils and mixed media, the emotional impact of color and color relationships is as important as the subject matter itself in her paintings. Recent work is especially concerned with the balance between saturated and muted hues depicted in her abstracted compositions. Rebecca earned Bachelor Degrees from University of Texas at Austin in both Fine Art and Liberal Arts as well as a post-graduate certificate in Non-Profit Management. She has a Master of Liberal Arts from Tulane University. She is retired from 30 years as a K-12 art teacher, and the staff art instructor at NOMA to focus on her own practice. She continues to be involved in art education teaching class, workshops, private lessons, and as an evaluator for the Talented in Visual Arts program. Presently, she teaches academically gifted high school students at Lycée Français. She serves on the Board of Directors for YAYA, Inc. and is on the Executive Committee. She is also a guest artist and studio instructor with the organization. Rebecca is the President of the Board of Directors of New Orleans Green Light, where she also creates original artwork on barrels for GLNO’s rain barrel program helping to address the environmental issues of the city. She has also participated in the CVU Utility Box program, painting four boxes located in public spaces through the city. Her work is included in the collections at Tulane University, A.B. Freeman School of Business; Jung Hotel New Orleans; Ochsner Elmwood Sports Medicine Center and North Louisiana Campus; Provenance Hotels, Portland,OR; Global Business Center, New Orleans; The “Queen Sugar”television series set, and various local and national private collections. She is currently affiliated with Where Y’Art Gallery in New Orleans.