Banuvar

Streets

These works explore the destabilization of traditional sacred iconography within contemporary visual culture. Drawing from inherited religious symbolism, the paintings dislocate these symbols from their historical and institutional frameworks and recontextualize them within a visual field shaped by graffiti lineage, pop aesthetics, child archetypes, and oversaturated American consumer culture.

At its core, the work confronts the tension between symbol as image and symbol as lived reality. By providing a space where reverence and irreverence coexist, collective blindness to the sacred embedded in moments of visual noise is challenged, inviting viewers to examine how power, trauma, and cultural memory shape what is seen as holy, real, or worthy of care.

Central to this practice is the concept of witnessing as resistance. In a media-saturated environment that encourages desensitization, to see the Divine, even in suffering, is to resist cultural amnesia. These paintings function as both witness and intervention, asking the viewer to reconsider what we have been conditioned not to see.

Portraits

EACH FACE IS BORN FROM AN UNDERPAINTING OF SYMBOLS, A HIDDEN LANGUAGE THAT SHAPES THE CHARACTER OF THE FINAL PORTRAIT. THIS LAYERING SERVES AS A METAPHOR FOR CULTURAL MEMORY - A PILING ON OF HISTORY THAT ULTIMATELY RESULTS IN COLLECTIVE AMNESIA, SHIELDING US FROM THE THINGS WE CANNOT BEAR TO SEE.

IN THESE WORKS THE PAINT ACTS AS A FORM OF RESISTANCE. SACRED ICONOGRAPHY, CHILD ARCHETYPES, AND IMAGERY FROM OVERSATURATED AMERICAN CONSUMER CULTURE ARE INTEGRATED BENEATH THE LINES OF THE FACE, INVITING THE VIEWER TO EXAMINE THE LAYERS OF MEANING BURIED BENEATH THE MASKS WE RECOGNIZE. ULTIMATELY, THE CANVAS BECOMES A SITE OF WITNESSING, PROVIDING THE SPACE TO EXPLORE HOW WE SEE OURSELVES, AND TO REEXAMINE WHAT WE HAVE BEEN CONDITIONED NOT TO SEE.  

private collections

Sedona, Arizona. Los Angeles, California. San Diego, California. London, England. Kansas City, Missouri. Jersey City, New Jersey. New York, New York. Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Charlotte, North Carolina.

EXHIBITIONS

2025 LAUREN BANUVAR:STRUCTURE VERSUS BLISS, MILANO, ITALIA. CURATOR: STEFANIA CARROZZINI, MYMICROGALLERY. 1-22 MARCH 2025.

2024 MICROCOSMOS OF WONDER, LOVERSO STUDIO, VENEZIA, ITALIA. CURATOR: STEFANIA CARROZZINI, MYMICROGALLERY. 26 OCTOBER-9 NOVEMBER 2024.

2024 GÉOGRAPHIE ÉMOTIONNELLE, ESPACE SYLVIA RIELLE, PARIS, FRANCE. CURATOR: STEFANIA CARROZZINI, MYMICROGALLERY. 8-21 JULY 2024.

2024 THE HEALING GAZE, MONTSERRAT CONTEMPORARY ART, NEW YORK, NY. CURATOR: STEFANIA CARROZZINI, MYMICROGALLERY. 1-30 MAY 2024.

2023-2024 7TH BANNER SERIES, CELEBRATING CORONADO ARTISTS. CORONADO, CA. CURATOR: CORONADO CULTURAL ARTS COMMISSION. APRIL-JUNE 2023 AND SEPTEMBER-NOVEMBER 2024.

PUBLICATIONS

ROSSI, SERENA. “MOSTRA DI ARTE CONTEMPORANEA STRUCTURE VERSUS BLISS DI LAUREN BANUVAR.” IL PENSIERO MEDITERRANEO, ILPENSIEROMEDITERRANEO.IT.

“ARTISTIC IMPRESSIONS.” CONDÉ NAST: THE WORLD OF INTERIORS. FEBRUARY, 2024. P. 137.

digital works