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Laura Splan is a New York based mixed media artist. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Art from the University of California, Irvine where she originally studied Biological Sciences. She received her Master of Fine Art in Sculpture from Mills College in Oakland, CA. Her conceptually driven work employs a variety of materials and processes that usually have a feminine sensibility about them. Unsettling scientific and medical imagery are foiled by more comfortable domestic imagery and craft processes. Her southern suburban upbringing in Tennessee nurtured her interest in the visual language of femininity, domesticity, and crafts. She explores that language as one that communicates via façade and designations of beauty and order in relation to the body or to the home. Her interest in science and medicine stems from a variety of experiences and interests. Both her father and sister worked for a company that manufactures surgical and medical products such as implants. This fostered her interest in medicine and gave her access to images and information she might otherwise not have had. Health epidemics, bio-terrorism, reality makeover shows, Botox parties, anti-microbial products, and pharmaceutical advertising all serve as fuel for inspiration for her work. Splan’s work has been exhibited widely at such venues as Track 16 Gallery (Santa Monica, CA), the 10th Annual Subtle Technologies Festival (Toronto), Art & Culture Center Of Hollywood (FL), Galerie SAW Gallery (Ontario, Canada), Catharine Clark Gallery (San Francisco), San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery, Los Angeles Center For Digital Art, San Francisco MOMA Artist’s Gallery, Southern Exposure (San Francisco), and the Museum of Contemporary Art (Santa Rosa, CA). She has had one-person exhibitions at the International Museum of Surgical Science (Chicago), The New York Hall of Science (New York City), Richmond Art Center (Richmond, CA) and Nathan Larramendy Gallery (Ojai, CA). Her work has been included in several surveys of emerging artists including New American Talent in 2004. Her work has been featured on Spark* onKQED (San Francisco, CA) and on Eight Forty-Eight on WBEZ (Chicago). She has been a visiting artist and lecturer at Maryland Institute College of Art, California College of Art, Cal Arts, San Francisco Art Institute, Stanford University, San Francisco Camerawork, and the New York Academy of Sciences. She was recently awarded a Jerome Foundation Travel & Study Grant for Visual Arts. Her work is included in the art collection of the University of California San Francisco Infectious Disease Department. Reviews of her work have appeared in Artweek, Discover Magazine, and Fiberarts.
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