BIOGRAPHY
Born in Coffs Harbour on 22nd March 1984, Lauren
Kelly Small grew up in the Orara Valley surrounded by farm animals and
wildlife. She loved reading fairytales, caring for animals and drawing with
pencils from a young age. Her love and understanding of horses occupied her imagination
and childhood. Every one of her school sketchbooks was filled with drawings of
her equine friends.
After graduating from Bishop Druitt College in 2001, Lauren
followed her dream to work with horses by studying Equine Studies at the
University of Queensland. She graduated in 2005 with distinction in the Diploma
of Applied Science. While studying, Lauren was experimenting with painting and
illustrating on canvas, with wild animals and horses continuing to be her main
subject matter.
While travelling around Australia with her family in 2003,
Lauren was visiting entirely new landscapes which inspired a collection of
drawings based on a mixture of fantasy, the Australian landscape and traditional
folklore from around the world.
In 2004 - 2006, while recovering from two serious horse
riding accidents; she continued her own self education in Visual Arts by
researching her favourite art movements and attending art workshops for
landscape drawing and portraiture. She also studied fashion design and
patternmaking at TAFE having always loved to design and create her own clothes.
In 2008, during research into digital art, Lauren found
inspiration from several Australian and European digital artists who worked in
the field of film concept art and children’s book illustration.
Recognizing her passion for detailed illustrations and the
realistic painted style that could be achieved with the digital medium, Lauren
immediately began teaching herself how to use Photoshop and began to create
elaborate illustrations inspired by the stories she had been reading and
creating while on her travels in Australia and overseas in Ireland and the
United Kingdom.
Ginger Kelly is the business name for all of Lauren’s
creative work in visual art, fashion design and jewellery. Over the past two
years of working as a freelance illustrator and graphic designer, Lauren’s
artwork has been awarded the 2009 Best 2D Artist in the Froudian Artist Awards
on World of Froud.com and First Place in the 2010 Fairies and Fantasy Art
Awards in the theme ‘Under The Sea’. Her website ‘Ginger Kelly Studio‘, which
she designed and created herself, recently won an award for outstanding website
design.
Lauren is always happy to answer any questions
about her art techniques and to share her knowledge of Photoshop with aspiring
artists. You can send her a message via the Contact form
