Lola Olvera

Originally published in “The Squeeze”

As an artist, Lauren Nicole is all about expressing herself — but there was a point in her life when she almost lost the ability to speak. 

When she was a teenager, two cars slammed into the car she was driving, causing her head to hit the window at over 55 miles an hour. At the hospital, she was advised to take an Advil, and then proceeded to spend the next ten years of her life with an undiagnosed brain injury. 

“I was losing a lot of my abilities,” she recalls. “There was a period of my life where I couldn’t string five words together.”

After finally receiving the care she needed, she heard of others struggling to navigate the same pitfalls of the healthcare system, and thought to herself, “This story can’t keep happening. I had to find a way that I could create awareness.”

Now, Lauren is dedicated to creating supportive spaces for neurodivergent and/or disabled people to engage with art. Recently she helped curate “Through the Cracks,” an art exhibition at Crear Studio that featured artwork by artists from the “Lost Girls/Lost Generation.” This term has come to describe the countless neurodivergent individuals, largely women, who grew up without a diagnosis because they either unconsciously learned to mask their symptoms, or had their symptoms dismissed or overlooked. 

Lauren was flagged for autism as a child but didn’t receive a formal assessment until she was an adult. Her paintings — vibrant portraits of feminine beings with unusual perspectives — convey to the viewer what having autism is like. 

“I want people to feel frustrated,” she says. “The whole point of my style is to make people think, ‘I know what that is, why does something feel weird? Why can’t I trust it?’ That emotion right there is what it feels to have a sensory processing difference.”

As part of her artist residency at Muckenthaler Cultural Center, she is working on an exhibit of paintings as well as an outdoor art installation that incorporates painting and beading, a nod to her indigenous heritage (Tongva, Chumash). The installation will explore extractive relationships, and the way in which neurodivergent, disabled, queer, and femme individuals are at a higher risk of predation. 

Lauren was also recently awarded the California Creative Corps 2023-2024 Artist Grant from the Arts Council for Long Beach and the California Arts Council. These opportunities have allowed her to begin leading sensory-safe open studio sessions and painting workshops designed to facilitate self-expression. She stresses the importance of accepting, empowering spaces. 

“[After the accident], my family gave me a soft place to land and to heal and I think a lot of us need that but the world doesn’t let us have that. It’s kind of an act of resistance to be like, ‘No — I will make a soft space with unconditional love.’”

Join Lauren Nicole for these upcoming events!

Sensory Open Studio for Neurodivergent & Disabled Adult Artists 

Every third Saturday 1PM-4PM at Laguna Health & Wellness

Register at bit.ly/fotasos

Color Your Emotions: An Intuitive Painting Workshop with Lauren Nicole

Saturday, March 2 1PM-2:30PM at Laguna Health & Wellness

Register at bit.ly/LNCC