Lauren Elder

Lauren Elder is a ceramic and mixed-media artist originally from Los Angeles and currently based in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Her work explores the intersections of material, form, and narrative, spanning painting, ceramic sculpture, and printmaking. Through these mediums, she investigates themes of transformation, memory, and cultural identity. Elder earned her BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is currently pursuing her MFA at the University of Arkansas, School of Art. Her work has been exhibited internationally in cities including London, Hong Kong, New York, Chicago, Amsterdam, Toronto, and Los Angeles. She has also shown at notable institutions such as the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago and the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art in Salt Lake City. Through a multidisciplinary approach, Elder continues to push the boundaries of ceramics and mixed media, creating works that invite dialogue between tradition and experimentation.

Artist Statement

My work weaves personal memory, cultural heritage, and inherited mythologies into immersive ceramic installations. Drawing from Persian miniatures, I layer symbols, patterns, and recurring animal figures into nonlinear narratives. These environments merge ancient materials and contemporary processes, creating shifting terrains where memory and myth coexist. In my latest work, clay and industrial materials coexist: horsehair-fired ceramics, laser-cut metals, and beaded fabric shells hold symbolic objects — a Persian rug–patterned windmill, mirrored daggers, a bird-shaped teapot on a horse trough. These immersive environments become shifting terrains where memory and myth collide, forming a living collage of personal and cultural fragments. Rooted in being from Los Angeles, my practice reflects the layered histories, diverse mythologies, and cultural hybridity that shaped my upbringing and continue to inform my artistic vision.