lauren simonutti

Lauren's film work is strange and surprising, and a technical anchor. She exemplifies the extraordinarily expressive merit of the medium she has chosen, and she demonstrates a clear mastery of the process that brings it to us. In the muddy roiling flood of contemporary everyman photography, her thoughtful, beautifu… Read more

Lauren's film work is strange and surprising, and a technical anchor. She exemplifies the extraordinarily expressive merit of the medium she has chosen, and she demonstrates a clear mastery of the process that brings it to us. In the muddy roiling flood of contemporary everyman photography, her thoughtful, beautiful works are superlative examples of considered composition. The tonal range of negative film has been rightfully worshiped, and Lauren employs its singular capability with striking effect using her own hands in the darkroom. In her photos, we are invited into a candid world just next door - a world of nakedness, a world that melts into itself, a world that stabs cruelly - and we are left somewhere between acceptance and stark wonder.

I place no particular value on the means of creating art, but find that much that purports to be "art photography" to be silly. To me a camera is a just a means to capture, make stories and an excuse to be in wonderful inspiring places. But just occasionally I see a glimmer of true art in an image by some one else. Tha… Read more

I place no particular value on the means of creating art, but find that much that purports to be "art photography" to be silly. To me a camera is a just a means to capture, make stories and an excuse to be in wonderful inspiring places. But just occasionally I see a glimmer of true art in an image by some one else. That glimmer became a outpouring of light when I first saw Laurens wonderful work. A real talent. The fact that her portrait so closely resembles Patti Smith in no way influenced my immediate love for her! I am a besotted fan of the Rabbit and wish her well on her trip to wonderland.

I am an atheist but I still recognize and value dearly those spiritual technologies that bring me out of my Self and allow communion with what I describe as "higher orders of consciousness". Lauren's art is just such a technology; she builds churches. In a comment on one of her many remarkable photographs I likene… Read more

I am an atheist but I still recognize and value dearly those spiritual technologies that bring me out of my Self and allow communion with what I describe as "higher orders of consciousness". Lauren's art is just such a technology; she builds churches. In a comment on one of her many remarkable photographs I likened her to Diana Lucifera. I stand by that comparison. These images are a guide through a shadowland. Some may wish to deny this place, to ignore the details of its landscape, but denial is made more difficult under the light of Lauren's vision. I am thankful that she sustains herself in a liminal state, a dark Promethean mother bringing to the profane the knowledge that boundaries are illusory. This may not be welcome or comfortable for some but for me......for me I am thankful to Lauren for the Work she does. I feel I am less alone having seen these images.

Visiting Lauren's photopool is like falling down the white rabbits hole through many different layers and landing in a kind of Georgian lighthouse that is her home, with its strange outsize checkerboard floors and austere walls. Fall deep enough and you'll hit the floor of her darkroom studio basement with its residen… Read more

Visiting Lauren's photopool is like falling down the white rabbits hole through many different layers and landing in a kind of Georgian lighthouse that is her home, with its strange outsize checkerboard floors and austere walls. Fall deep enough and you'll hit the floor of her darkroom studio basement with its resident huge spider, but then, perhaps that's falling too far! Lauren's photographic world is her house and her house is the background subject for her surreal photography. She mostly shoots in the classic studio camera format and makes delicious contact prints from the negatives for us to see in the Flickr world. She's a gifted writer and has a razor sharp, deadpan wit, she's also ahead of her time and I can see great things coming her way very soon. I'm so happy to have fallen into her dark surreal world!