Layla Luna
Fort Worth, TX
Layla Luna (b. 1975) is an exhibiting painter with a focus on southwestern landscapes and the author and illustrator of a children’s story series called The Lolly Stories. The exploration of home, nature, and storytelling are the major components of both her painting practice and illustrations.
Luna was born in Fort Worth, TX. She received an MFA in Painting from Texas Christian University in 2016 and a BFA in Painting from Arizona State University in 2008. She studied at Massey University in Wellington, New Zealand where she obtained a Postgraduate Diploma in Fine Art in 2011. Artist-in-residence programs around the country have played a large role in feeding her need to explore and make work in new environments. Currently Luna resides in Fort Worth, Texas with her daughter, husband, and three pups.
My studio practice is dedicated to unpacking the idea of home. For years, I believed that to gain an understanding of home, an exhaustive search was required. I remained untethered and in constant motion for a very long stretch, oftentimes pondering the irony of leaving home in order to find it. Then the craziest thing happened…I had a baby. Emmie’s arrival provided the truest understanding of home. It also reconnected me to my kid self which led to a fantastic studio superpower: the confidence to play.
My time of moving fast and forward led to the many things that form the armature for the work I make today. It sparked my love of the desert. It made me believe that certain places and objects hold hauntedness within them. It rekindled the joy of storytelling and allowed me to find charm in the fact that memories cannot be entirely trusted.
Or I could’ve just said that I make southwest-inspired landscape paintings, draw silly illustrations about an adventurous little girl named Lolly, and write stories that keep the fire lit to my inner kid.
