Since childhood, Rennie has been drawing and painting scenes from her imagination. She began showing and selling her pieces as a teenager in her parents’ gallery.
Rennie considers her imagination coupled with her love of world cultures to be key ingredients in the creation of her paintings. Her travels throughout North America and other parts of the world have given her a wealth of visual information to draw upon. Her many trips to Mexico and exposure to the folk art there has especially influenced her use of vibrant color and love of dense pattern. An extended stay in Ireland has inspired her to explore religious and mythological themes. Traveling throughout the southern United States she has been touched by the uninhibited whimsy of the region’s “outsider” art. She is an avid collector of worldwide folk arts, American pottery and wood carving, and many of these objects find their way into her compositions.
“I strive to tell a story with each painting, to communicate something very personal to each viewer, awaken a memory or let them find the artistry in everyday objects. I’ve found that each viewer brings their own special set of experiences with them which informs their understanding of the work. Many times this leads them to interpret the work in a way I didn’t originally intend. That’s why art is so endlessly fascinating…it’s such a highly personal experience.”
For 22 years Rennie had worked at Walt Disney Imagineering as a senior concept designer, creating and visualizing ideas for Disney theme parks around the world. In 1989 her work hung in the Disney Gallery inside Disneyland as part of a special exhibition highlighting the fine art talents of Disney designers. In 1998, her work was among the pieces in a traveling exhibit, "The Architecture of Reassurance", which showed locally at the Armand Hammer Museum of Art in Los Angeles. Her work also appeared in the accompanying book of the same name.
In the 1990’s, Rennie began exhibiting her work in earnest. She has been featured in several one-woman and group shows at The Folk Tree, The Folk Tree Collection, and elsewhere in the Pasadena, CA area since 1997.
Rennie received her BFA degree from the University of California at Long Beach. She also studied at the Laguna College of Art and Art Center College of Design. Her work hangs in many private art collections in the U.S., Mexico, and abroad. She is currently living and painting in Seal Beach, CA.