Meet ARTSQ cofounder Lauren!
Q: Introduce yourself!
Hey there, adventurers! I’m Lauren. The first thing you should know about me is that I love a good story—not just epic adventure and fantasy tales but also the ones that relate to people living their lives, today and in the past. Our world is a weird, beautiful, and challenging place and even the smallest things can reveal wondrous stories. I especially enjoy those tied to seemingly mundane objects, like a ring worn around someone’s neck or the wall colors in someone’s home. Kids in my neighborhood affectionately call my house “the rainbow house” because it’s filled with brightly painted walls in turquoise, magenta, seafoam, forest green, purple, and cherry red. Colors make me happy (and white walls make me sad), but also each color was chosen because it connects to something in my life. This is also why I wear bright red glasses.
Frida Kahlo, Viva la Vida, 1954, oil on masonite. Museo Frida Kahlo, Mexico City
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
I’ve always been a big history nerd because of my love of exciting stories! As a kid I was obsessed with people like Amelia Earhart, Frida Kahlo, and Cleopatra, and I would lose myself in any book about cultures from around the world, from ancient Egypt and the Aztecs to medieval Europe and the ancient southwest. Some of my family came from Ireland, so I enjoy learning about my ancestors and Irish culture, as well as slowly studying the Irish language (I’m a big language nerd).
One of my favorite places in Ireland—the remote island of Skellig Michael, which has an old medieval monastery. It’s also a Puffin sanctuary! And is now famous because it was in the more recent Star Wars movies….
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
People describe my office as “the nutty professor’s office,” which means it’s organized chaos with a lot of books (on shelves and in piles!) and gizmos and art projects and plants and peg boards. I tinker with lots of things, and sometimes I break things apart just to see how they work and fit back together (that doesn’t always work out).
On the Skyline Trail at Mount Rainier National Park, 2023
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
I am awed and inspired by the awesomeness of the great outdoors. Trees and moss delight me. Imagine the many tales they could tell! I am equally happy winding my way through remote ancient archaeological sites, climbing pyramids (when it’s allowed), or going on urban hikes to find cool street art. I really, really, really want to visit all the National Parks with my family, though my kids might not feel the same after a recent hike at Mount Rainier National Park took us 7 hours with a 1700’+ elevation gain.
Q: Was art a part of your life growing up?
Art was integral to my life growing up. My grandmother, Grace, was an artist, and she and I painted together, often in the Oregon woods. She taught me to find beauty in everything, even the tiniest leaf or flower that might otherwise be ignored. 🌲
Ear ornament with deer, Moche, 640–650 CE, gold and turquoise, from the Tomb of the Lord of Sipán (Tomb 1), Peru.
(Photo: Thad Zajdowicz, CC0)
I was really shy as a kid and had to wrestle with some difficult life events at a young age, and creating art helped me to grapple with all of it. Watercolors and oils were (and are) my jam, but drawing in pastels is a close second. On school field trips, I loved visiting museums to experience artworks in person—though I had little knowledge about the history of art because it was never taught to me until college! I still remember the joy I felt seeing Diego Rivera’s Flower Day at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art for the first time and the immense awe I experienced walking through Royal Tombs of Sipán show at the Fowler Museum at UCLA as a kid. I’d never seen that much gold and silver, though it makes sense now as it is the richest tomb ever discovered in the Americas. That show deeply influenced me and my path, though I didn’t know it yet at the time. Visiting the Maasai people in Tanzania as a teenager also unsettled my world—in the best way possible—and I spent years processing what I learned and felt in painting.
I wanted so badly to go to an art school when I graduated high school but instead I followed another path into science. Though, life had more surprises in store for me.
Q: How did you get into the field of art history
(what is art history anyway?!)?
Pajamas—this is how I got into studying the history of art. If ever you’ve wondered if small, seemingly insignificant decisions can have major consequences, well, here is your evidence! My desire to wear pajamas—the warmest, coziest, softest fleece pajamas—during a blistering cold Boston winter is the reason I became an art historian.
Let’s go back in time for a moment, to when I was a sophomore in college. I was very serious about my pre-med major in Biology and my double minors in History and Archaeology (side note: yes, I am an overachiever). I had a lot of labs for the Bio major, so I wanted a class that allowed me to roll out of bed in my pajamas five minutes before class started and wouldn’t conflict with the labs. Enter Art History 101, from caves to cathedrals, a class chosen solely because it took place at the perfect time. On the first day, I showed up yawning, with pillow marks pressed into my face and grumbling about a silly class.
But let me tell you: by the end of the class I felt sharp as a tack and my eyes were wide with excitement! I’d never been so intrigued by anything, and I knew then that my life would never be the same. Fun fact too: that class was taught by Fred Kleiner, who also writes and edits the very well-known textbook called Gardner’s Art Through the Ages.
A page chronicling the life of Lord Eight Deer Jaguar Claw, from The Tonindeye (or Zouche-Nuttall) Codex, Mixtec (Ñudzavui), 1200–1521 CE, deer skin.
(Photo: © Trustees of the British Museum)
I abandoned my pre-med track and Biology major the next semester after I took a Pre-Columbian art class about Mexico, Central America, and the Andes by the wonderful Clemency Coggins. I had never experienced nor seen anything so endlessly fascinating, and it made me a die-hard fan of the art of the Aztecs, Mixtecs, and Maya in particular. I remember that I also felt upset (nay, enraged!) that I’d really never learned anything about cultures and peoples and places that were directly relevant to the world, to where I grew up, and so on and so forth. Why hadn’t I learned about the epic life of Lord 8 Deer Jaguar Claw and how it was painted in Mixtec books? Or the amazing sacred story of the Popol Vuh by the K’iche’ Maya that rivals any piece of epic “western” literature? Or the stunning Aztec artworks made entirely of iridescent feathers? That class was the initial spark that made me want to get a PhD in Latin American art history and become a professor so that I could share all these amazing and inspiring stories with future students, and now even more people!
I would be very remiss in not shouting out Charlene Villaseñor Black and Cecelia Klein, my two advisors at UCLA who played fundamental roles in who I am today as an art historian and person. Without them, I’d be doing something very different indeed. They also showed me what was possible and always pushed me to be thoughtful and creative.
Q: What do you do at ARTSQ?
What do you like most about your role?
I’ve always wanted to be a pirate captain (I adore The Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland), and now that is pretty much what I am! 🏴☠️ With a band of fearless but merry rogues, I explore and plunder the guarded intellectual booty from behind formidable barriers. Ahoy! You can see how much fun I am at parties.
If this skeleton pirate can do it, then so can I! At Disneyland’s Pirates of the Caribbean, 2023
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
In all seriousness, my role at ARTSQ is somewhat like steering a big ship: seeing where we want to go, making sure we have what we need, plotting the course, and setting sail to get there. We have a lot of moving parts behind the scenes, and I enjoy finding ways to keep us all afloat, even when things get rough! I also produce a lot of the content for ARTSQ. All of this means that I do a variety of different things each day, which I enjoy. I research and write, edit, record audio, produce videos, fix images, analyze data, think too much about marketing and analytics (IYKYK), and a lot more.
I love putting all my skills, expertise, and knowledge into practice to find ways to get people excited and engaged with the incredible stories told through art. It’s rewarding to find different ways to invite people along for a journey, regardless of their background or interests. This is why we have videos and books, and soon creative projects and other types of resources.
Screenshot of a small portion of a video in production
It might not look like it on the surface but a lot of hardwork and creative brainstorming goes into each “thing” we produce. One recent video took a few months from the initial idea to the finished product.
My absolute favorite part of ARTSQ is the incredibly talented, kind, and passionate people I get to build and work with each day.
Q: What are your favorite works of art?
This question causes me a lot of Angst! I can’t possibly decide so I will write some that pop into my head at this very moment.
Because cats are pawsome!
Photos, from left to right: Beth van Hoesen, Bugs, 1985. Portland Art Museum. Photo: Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. Pierre Bonnard, Le chat blanc, 1894. Musée d'Orsay. Photo: Brian Jeffery Beggerly, CC BY 2.0. Feline-shaped bottle, Paracas, 800–400 BCE. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Zhu Ling, Black Cat and Narcissus, 19th century. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Anything with cats. 🐈 🐈⬛
Chonky cats, tiny cats, weird cats, big cats, from anywhere at any time. If there is a feline in it, I’m sold.
El Greco (Domenikos Theotokopoulos), Fray Hortensio Félix Paravicino, 1609. Boston Museum of Fine Arts
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 [a sad photo from my phone])
The first work of art that challenged me was a portrait by the painter El Greco (real name Domenikos Theotokopoulos) in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. I was immediately drawn to it. As a 19 year-old, it seemed so twisty and weird and unpolished compared to the many other portraits I’d seen at museums like The Getty. I was also really into 80s punk and New Wave music, and El Greco’s portrait captured that music for me in paint.
An incredible hike up to the mesa above to get this iconic shot! The Great House of Pueblo Bonito from the mesa above, Chaco Canyon, 9th–12th century CE
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
My favorite place is Chaco Canyon in New Mexico. It is impossible to describe the awesomeness of this breathtaking site, which was a bustling place more than a thousand years ago. When you are there today, it requires a little bit of imagining what it was once like, but that’s part of the fun! Getting there is part of the adventure, but the reward is that you will experience a place that has ancestral ties to many different Native American groups in the southwest (we are but visitors!). If you camp overnight, you will witness the most gorgeous sky.
Page from the Book of Kells. Can you find the kitties?! Book of Kells, c. 800 CE
(Photo: Trinity College Dublin)
Two works of art that I could study for years yet still find new things each time I look are the Book of Kells (a medieval Irish manuscript) and the Codex Nuttall (a Ñudzavui or Mixtec accordion codex). I’m cheating a little bit because these both are filled with many, many rich and detailed images. I get lost in them and let my mind wander, inventing my own stories along the way.
Félix González-Torres, Untitled (Ross in L.A.), 1991. Art Institute of Chicago
(Photo: mark6mauno, CC BY 2.0)
The work of art that makes me cry in its simplicity yet depth is Félix González-Torres’s Untitled (Ross in L.A.). Imagine walking into a room and seeing a pile of candy in the corner. If you are like me, you might wonder: “how in the world is that art?!” Well, this work is about the concept behind what González-Torres wanted to do, and that is to have us grapple with the loss of a loved one, to reflect on someone who wasted away from a horrible illness. González-Torres made the candy pile the weight of his partner, Ross Laycock, who died from AIDS-related complications in 1991. The candy weighs 175 lbs, which was Ross’s weight. Anyone who enters the room can take a piece from the candy pile, so it eventually disappears, just as Ross eventually did. But the museum then replenishes it, and it is like Ross is given new life each time. Every time I think about this work of art, I sob. It’s just such a beautiful way to remember someone and to think about loss and continuous renewal. The artwork is far more complex really, and I am not doing it justice.
Q: Where is your favorite place to look at art?
Juan O'Gorman, Central Library, Historical Representation of Culture, 1950–56, UNAM, Mexico City
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Mexico City!
It’s the most vibrant city to experience and look at art and architecture! You can walk into 18th-century churches filled with golden altarpieces and colorful paintings or wind through the ruins of the Aztecs’ Great Temple (the Templo Mayor) or see mind-blowing contemporary art, all while eating the most delicious food. I’m a big fan of getting to know a place not just through art, but also its street food. The energy that pulses through Mexico City is indescribable.
Q: Do you have advice for people who want to learn more about art but don’t know where to start?
I get it—this can be so daunting! As a parent with younger kids, I’ve learned the hard way how challenging it can be to get kids engaged with art and history. Sometimes the spaces we associate with art or history, like museums, aren't always the most welcoming space for them. I once asked my oldest daughter why she didn’t want to go to a museum with me (she was 6 at the time), and she responded, “Why do I want to go to a place where I can’t talk loudly or yell or run or touch stuff?” I think about this answer a lot! What she tried to tell me is that to engage with art she needed to do so on her terms, with her body and mind. I’ve continued to try other creative ways to help those who are young (and young at heart it turns out!), and I’m happy to report that a few of them have worked! (Hint: It often involves snacks and animals.) I’ve carried that approach to ARTSQ.
My kids actually, kinda sorta enjoy museums now! Here they are in the Hall of the Aztecs at the National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico City in 2023
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
So here are a few tips that could work for some of you! Learning about art can be as simple as taking a stroll through your neighborhood, or looking closely at what’s in your own home or backyard. I bet you can find something that grabs your attention, maybe a street mural or a sculpture in someone’s yard or even a painted utility box on the street. Maybe you have a poster on the wall or a family heirloom on a shelf. Sometimes just looking at something for an extended period of time and asking questions about it is the best way to begin learning about art and history. Then, you can try to find ways to get those questions answered—be it in a book, online, talking with teachers or librarians, or even reaching out to the ARTSQ team!
My kids made some poor museum guards very nervous while replicating the pose of this figurine of a Maya ballplayer at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City
(Photo: Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
If you have a chance to head to a museum, but feel intimidated, I would encourage everyone to try to invent games or scavenger hunts beforehand. Find a cat, identify something green, locate a silly detail, pose like your favorite sculpture, sketch something for 20 seconds. This is something my family loves to do (not just the kids!), and it can prompt really fun conversations in front of the art itself and even inspiration for your own art, stories, games, and so much more!
Q: Ok, just for fun—what is your superpower? 🦸🏼
I can steer any conversation or seemingly ordinary experience to relate to the history of art! It’s a gift. A really nerdy, spectacular gift. For example, whenever I visit Disneyland (I grew up nearby, so I’m a super fan), I could have endless conversations about all the art history references in every land or ride or experience. I’ve an ever-growing notebook that lists the specific references, and I am up past 100….
