About the work
I approach every new painting as a unique challenge and a discovery process. My paintings come from instinct and intuition, and my contact with the canvas is responsive, like a conversation, telling and listening.
I think of the content of my paintings as a glimpse of something, an encounter, where the glimpse becomes the starting idea for the painting. The paintings go through many changes, hundreds of micro-decisions, revisions, additions, overlays, etc. as I work. I believe in taking chances with the work and not being afraid of ruining the initial layers.
The work consists of a combination of painting and printmaking. I use hand-made printmaking tools to print my designs onto very thin Japanese paper, and then collage the paper in layers interspersed with pools of acrylic paint.
Although much of my work is nature-based and landscape inspired, I rarely use specific imagery to make my paintings. Instead my work is a reflection of what I've experienced and observed and I make a point to observe unusual juxtapositions. Most of my imagery comes from drawings that I've made. The drawings are abstract and I draw quickly to encourage a feeling of movement.
My work is also influenced by living in Japan as a child and experiencing the Japanese tradition of wabi-sabi, which is defined by impermanence, imperfection, visual economy and intimacy.
While painting, I participate in a delicate balancing act between creating something complete and ordered, with leaving just enough imbalance and disorder to allow for movement, rhythm and ambiguous transitions as the painting comes to completion.
BIOGRAPHY
Laura Fayer is a painter living and working in New York City. She is a recipient of a grant from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation and has exhibited in galleries nationally and internationally, including solo and group shows at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, Flinn Gallery Greenwich, Ruth Bachofner Gallery in Santa Monica, Thomas Robertello Gallery in Chicago, Kathryn Markel Fine Arts in NYC, Lanoue Gallery in Boston, Andrea Schwartz Gallery in San Francisco, and Galerie du Tableau in Marseille.
She was awarded grants from International Residencies for Artists and the Massachusetts Cultural Council for a fellowship to live and work at Triangle France in Marseille, and was in residence at Baer Arts Center in Iceland in 2019. She has also been a resident fellow at the MacDowell Colony, Yaddo and the Bemis Center for Contemporary Art. Her early childhood years in Japan have a strong influence on her work.
Fayer’s work is in many corporate and public collections, including Avon Headquarters, Norwegian Cruise Lines, NYU Langone Hospitals, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, the Londoner in Macau, Grand Hyatt in Kauai, Ritz Carltons in Atlanta and Shenzhen, China, and the US Embassy in Djibouti.
She has an undergraduate degree from Harvard University’s Department of Art, Film and Visual Studies, and holds an MFA in painting from Hunter College in New York City.