Biography

While attending graduate school at the Maryland Institute College of Art, Eileen first began creating works on paper featuring her Belgian Sheepdog, Zoey. Colleagues and the media began referring to the young Zegar, as “the dog lady”

The works were mixed media collages integrating her drawings and found images, executed in oil pastel, pencil and model paints. Her drawings ended up in a number of curated shows to include the Corcoran Museum of Art, W.D.C. and reviewed on the front page of the Washington Post Sunday Style section.

Zegar went on to create sculptures including a 5′ high-heeled shoe covered in fake fur. The piece ended up in the Children’s’ Museum in Baltimore.

Her illustrative style of dog art ended up being used in editorial illustrations for newspapers, including the Washington Post and Washington Star magazine.

Zegar’s simple carving of a “Mexican folk toy” in the image of Zoey ended up becoming the model for a series of thematically adorned cast sculptures. These pieces were shown at the Craft & Folk Art Museum in Los Angeles.

Zoey passed away and Eileen created an alter to honor her life and store her ashes until they were scattered.

Dog art has always been apart of her work. Zegar has shown in galleries in Los Angeles, and worked extensively on an oil pastel on paper landscapes series she calls “Land Meditations.” These pieces are in many private collections and have appeared in film and television.

Today, Eileen again finds herself painting dogs all over again. She started with an oil pastel rendering of her dog, Montana. Later she decided to paint her Japanese Chin, Ralph in a more dignified oil painting.