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Lauris, Dubai-based and Dubai-lover, is an award-winning Visual Artist and the Founder & Creative Director of Lauris Zailaa’ Visual Communication & Consultancy (LZVCC).
After completing a masters degree in Visual Arts and Communication in London, Lauris spent some time working as an Art Director with Young and Rubicam (Y&R) Dubai, one of the most creative ad agencies in the region. But her heart and passion remained in Art… In creating… In getting her hands dirty.
After succeeding and shining in many different aspects of visual art (’Speaking without speaking!’ – as she describes it), Lauris decided to put all these services under one roof. In 2010, she started Lauris Zailaa’ Visual Communication & Consultancy (LZVCC). A Dubai based name that offers multiple services in the world of visual communication.
Through this journey, she aspires to take people’s and companies’ visual appeal and potential to unprecedented heights from image consulting, brand transformation and identity creation & direction, all the way to coming up with mad ideas, designing products, sculptures, painting, and her big passion for Calligraphy, in which she combines classical Arabic Calligraphy with a modern geometrical twist.
’Don’t ask her to think outside the box, she doesn’t even know where the box is!’ a close friend once stated. One day you will see Lauris on a canvas almost as tall as her, all covered with paint. And other days you will see her on a very neat table, designing a product, testing it, measuring it and repeating. She is that messy artist and she is that neat perfectionist. ’The Queen of OCD’ as she describes her self. With Lauris you can never predict it right. She is that dual humorous vibrant character which translates clearly in her work.
In the words of the late Alan Fletcher, artist and author of The Art of Looking Sideways (2001), ’I love working with Lauris. She looks left when everyone else looks right”. In her words, ”Negatives are just positives, ugly is beauty, and imperfection is there for you to complete it... It all depends on how you see it.’
Her unique art work all comes to be as a result of her unpredictable eye for things. In describing how it happens, her best friend, a writer and social media director, explains, ’Her train of thought – I don’t know if it could be called that – is a series of bridges ending at unforeseen ideas that are not short of brilliant. That would look pretty cool if mapped! And that right there is where it all starts’.
Her latest lightbulb moment resulted in a series of beautiful serving platters sculptures (ThéUpsideDown collection), where not only does each piece tell a mini-story, but each also has its own unique mini-music box! Of course nothing is ever simple or straightforward with Lauris, she also started a collection called ’Min Hayati’ | From My Life. A Modern Arabic Calligraphy of 150 x 150 CM series of canvases that not only allows us to experience tiny glimpses into Lauris’s life, emotions & little stories, but also embarks us on a journey full or mad surprises. All on that canvas.
Her passion for the mixing of cultures and showing us the classic Arabic Calligraphy in her own unique way resulted in her recently being recognised by the International Emerging Artists Awards, where Lauris was named as the Grand Winner among hundreds of artists from around the world. Her winning artwork OneLOVE for the IEAA can now be seen in the latest QlockTwo Artist Limited Edition collection showcased exclusively at the MB&F MAD Gallery in Dubai.
If you’re looking for Lauris, you will usually find her at her warehouse studio, or her house that she took over and in which she made a studio in every corner, or in her kitchen, – as she is also a gourmet enthusiast, – staring into space, eyes wide open and unblinking for minutes at a time, until something explodes with colors! ’She is always creating something! And she never seize to stun me EVERY TIME!’ her husbands adds.