A painter of western genre, William Reese was raised on his family's cattle ranch in central Washington state and from that time had a love of horses, which is obvious in many of his western paintings. He also painted landscape, still life and marine scenes. Reese was educated at the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles and at Washington State University, Pullman. His grandmother gave him his first art lessons, using a text book by Charles Lederer, Drawing Made Easy. Of that book, Reese said: "I still have it, or what's left of it. I devoured that book." Although oil was his primary medium, Reese also worked with watercolor, pastel, sculpture, etching and lithography, and found he learned something from each one. Suffering from lung disease, Reese nearly died at age 31, but refusing to give in, determined to live his dreams of painting and traveling and playing the guitar, something he did several hours each day. In 1971, he set up his studio in Washington and also began giving private lessons. The next year, he had his first major exhibition, which was at the Frye Art Museum in Seattle. Source: Amanda Giovetti, "William F. Reese, The Unstoppable", ART-TALK, June, July 2006. Added note: William F. Reese passed away on Sunday, June 6, 2010.