We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Rebecca Katz. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Rebecca below.

Rebecca, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Are you happy as a creative professional? Do you sometimes wonder what it would be like to work for someone else?

I’m thrilled to have gotten to a place in my life where I have fully embraced my creativity. I’ve been an entrepreneur for 22 years. Prior to that I had regular jobs in marketing/communications. And while that experience served me well, I wasn’t cut out to work for others. I’m too much of a renegade.

Rebecca, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I grew up with a spatula in one hand and a paintbrush in another, among a family of artists and cooks. I received my first watercolors at age 5, when I also observed my mother and grandmother transforming mounds of brilliant vegetables into delicious, comforting soups. I’ve blended the two together, as chef/author of 5 award-winning cookbooks and a painter. In my twenties I worked in marketing in NYC. One grey day, in my tall grey office building in my grey office, I had a flash of insight. If I continued on my current career path, not only would I be burned out in short order, but I would live a grey life. I fled to Italy, with no language and no luggage (mine was lost), clutching a map in Italian and my innate curiosity, I found color, texture and atmosphere. I found a studio to paint in mornings and an Italian signora to teach me cooking in the afternoons. I began a life of exploration, inspiration and healing through food and art, and offering that to the world of people in search of both.
I became a professional chef. I found my niche in food and healing. I played with flavor, color and texture to connect nutrition science to the plate, and pioneered an intelligent, novel and delicious use of food in the treatment of cancer.
Today, I find making art and cooking creatively are both opportunities to be fully present in life, to pay attention to color, texture and composition. To be inspired by nature. To be so absorbed in tasks that time expands. Working in my kitchen or studio is an immersion experience, in a vibrant, reverent, tactile, visual world.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

For me, life has been a series of explorations in search of meaning, inspiration and healing.

My adventures began on a street corner in Rome. I had fled marketing career burnout in New York City and arrived in Italy with no luggage and no language, only my curiosity and a paper map in hand. No GPS, no Google maps, and no phone! I was waiting for an Italian signora to lead me to her palatial teaching kitchen, where I would become immersed in the joy of cooking in the evenings. In the mornings I made art in a studio and discovered that both food and art are intensely creative, and that both are healing. I was enchanted.

Returning to New York, I became a professional chef. I found my niche in food and healing. I played with flavor, color and texture to connect nutrition science to the plate, and pioneered an intelligent, novel and delicious use of food in the treatment of cancer. I authored 7 cookbooks, including The Cancer-Fighting Kitchen and The Cancer-Fighting Kitchen online course. My painting was on the back burner simmering away, until I decided to move it to the front burner in 2017. I took another leap of faith and committed to my painting full time. So much of the chances I took earlier in my life set me up for the deep joy I’m experiencing in the creative work I’m creating now in my early 60’s.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

Authenticity!

Contact Info:

• Website: rebecca@rebeccakatzart.com
• Instagram: @rebeccakatzart
• Other: www.rebeccakatz.com (My culinary website)