LauraJane Reilly (pronunciation: LAW-ruhJAYN RY-lee; born 31 October 1983) is an American artist known for her design and illustration work, often in the realm of advertising. Schooled formally in print and digital, her career has been geared toward visual communication. Her design style is often precise, simplified versions of complex ideas. Her illustrations run the gamut of aesthetics, stylistically adjusting to the tone that needs to be conveyed.

Early Career

Laura in 1986.

From the ripe age of 3, she learned how to crawl into her father's desk chair and figured out how to play on his Commodore computer. She played Barbie and Hot Wheels games, mostly. Later came the Packard Bell and AOL in the 90s and she found herself dabbling in the newly born Photoshop app. She made herself mini music videos in Nickelodeon Director's Lab. She built sites in Angel Fire. She made music videos in Flash.

Aside from her computer skills, she took up ballet for almost a whole month and started her first job when she was 7. She sold lipstick door-to-door with her mom who was a well known "Avon Lady." This was her first foray into sales. She's loved working ever since.

Work as a Young Adult
Though working a wide array of day jobs to financially support herself, some in creative positions, some not, she always freelanced in the arts. Her first design job was exchanging a logo design for a haircut. Various other roles included caricatures, airbrushing, theater direction, creative team management, interior design, wedding planning, tattoo illustrations, building websites, and consulting on corporate branding. She also fixed woodwind instruments and taught music on the side so she could save up for a guitar (which she did).

Laura spent six years in college. The first three were at a community school where she learned about Cultural Anthropology and general studies, gaining an Associates in Psychology and Liberal Arts. She never lost sight of her art though. The last three years of college were spent at Rowan University. There she won awards for her book designs welcoming all new students and made advertisements for school functions. The intensive courses resulted in a Bachelor's of the Arts, but she continued on in her studies, becoming part of the first class who offered a specialized degree -- Bachelor's of Fine Art with a specialization in Graphic Design and Illustration.

Moving to Pennsylvania

After graduating, she worked at media agencies and freelanced in design and photography, but paid the bills selling computers and cameras in south Jersey. Having her heart set on building a career devoted to her passion, she became a designer at a social media website, MyYearbook (now The Meet Group). She moved to Pennsylvania in 2008 to be closer to their home office.

With the world of technology constantly evolving, so did her career path. She went from a website designer to an advertising designer in both mobile as well as web. She traversed the quickly emerging online advertising industry working with hundreds of major advertising companies. After a couple years, she became Senior Designer. A few more after that, a Creative Director. She built an extensive network of creative agencies, working directly between clients and her sales team. She worked with top brands and famous celebrities. She continues to work in advertising even now, at the same company for over a decade.

Laura with Alfonso Ribeiro (aka Carlton Banks)

Present Day
In addition to her day job, she works on her own art projects. She's run photo challenges along with other professionals as well as amateurs encouraging the creation of hundreds of photographs throughout the years. She's taught visual layouts of Bullet Journals. She's participated in the global art challenges like Inktober, where artists have to complete a themed illustration every day for the month of October. Also, she's run her own "Tile Journal" for over 100 days. The "Tile Journal" consisted of a visual journal of square vector graphics she created in Adobe Illustrator.

She continues to seek out new creative minds and projects.

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RÉsumÉ

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Born

LauraJane Reilly
31 Oct. 1983 - (present)
Lakewood, NJ

Education

Rowan University
BFA Graphic Design and Illustration

Known for

Graphic Design
Illustration

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Currently residing in New Hope, PA. Willing to relocate anywhere snowflakes are not.

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