Artist
LK
AKA Laura Anne Kelley. I am the combination of my mom’s thrift store hunting and my dad’s “we can build it” engineering. Before ever thinking of myself as an artist, I could see objects for not only what they were but what I could transform them to be.
My creativity ranges from paintings to textile work to the backyard garden (and the front yard garden). I attempt to hang on to moments that otherwise slip right past. Moments like stolen glances at a beautiful stranger, grandma fixing you some tea, lightning bugs in the summer. Moments I’m constantly afraid that I’ll eventually forget. Creating has become my way of preserving those feelings.
You might be surprised to learn that I am an electrical engineer with a Master’s from a French University. I’ve spent years solving complex technical problems. It may seem like an odd transition but I have come to think of engineering as it’s own sense of art. In a situation when one asks “How can this abstract image in my mind come to life”, one is performing both engineering and art.
I enjoy figuring things out, even when I have to do it the hard way first. I will get my hands dirty, I will complain endlessly, but in the end, I will usually arrive at a solution that is a good jumping off point. I live by the code “make it exist first, make it good later.” If you know who to attribute that quote to, let me know, I owe them my life.
As far as where I’m based, the truth is Maryland (near DC) but I refuse to settle in one place for too long, and I haven’t yet found a place I would want to! Change is good for the soul and I can find things to love (and hate) everywhere that I’ve ever been. Some may think of this as indecisive but “a rolling stone gathers no moss”, right? I’m on a perpetual journey to learn new places, people, or practices. Hopefully leaving some of my own in my wake for others. Many of these experiences are reflective in my works.
We’re all living life for the first time. I will change, evolve, swerve, zig and zag over time. But if we can dream it… whatever, let’s try it.
