ARTIST SPOTLIGHT: Meet Lauren Ottley, Chicago-area Contemporary Abstract and Figurative Artist

Lynne Kornecki
3 hours ago
2 min read

Updated: 2 minutes ago

Awakening: 36" x 36" -- Private Collection; Scroll down to view more of Lauren's work... — **Awakening: 36" x 36" -- Private Collection;** ***Scroll down to view more of Lauren's work...***

Lisle, IL-based artist, Lauren Ottley, enjoyed taking art classes in high school and was always drawn to sketching figures or fashion while growing up. As the oldest of five children, she dreamed of a fashion career. As time went on, her educational path led her into cosmetology, however she remained dedicated to art by experimenting on her own with acrylic, charcoal and dabbling in other media.

Today, she is a highly sought after artist with work in many private collections across the United States and abroad. She is also the art curator at Celestial Art Curation Gallery in Hinsdale, IL. Her professional affiliations include membership in Women's Caucus for Art, Chicago chapter and Woman Made Gallery, Chicago.

Her work has been featured in a variety of publications from Design Chicago magazine, Hinsdale Living and Luxe to Naperville magazine. Working alone or with another artist, Alicia Urbanski, for "Shared Gravity" at Celestial Art Curation Gallery in Hinsdale, IL, her work captures your eye with its contradictions and tension. Her next artistic steps include working on larger pieces and eventually getting her own studio space.

Here's what Lauren says about her work:

"I'm a multidisciplinary artist based in the Chicago suburbs whose work explores presence, identity, memory, and the quiet complexities of womanhood through abstraction, figurative studies, and layered floral motifs.

"Working across traditional, digital, and literary mediums, I create paintings and drawings that balance softness with emotional depth. My work often exists in the tension between vulnerability and resilience examining the stories we inherit, the narratives we construct about ourselves, and what it means to return fully to the self.

"Influenced by personal experience, human connection, and the emotional landscapes shared between women, my practice invites reflection while offering subtle moments of recognition and affirmation."

To connect with Lauren and learn more about her work, please follow her on Instagram @Laurenottley.art or visit her at https://pomlostudio.com.