A solo show is usually difficult for painters since it requires a lot of paintings to fill a gallery. Naomi Laufer was invited back by Show Gallery, after the manager saw her drawing in a group show from Art Heart. Most of her drawings and paintings are of 2 females, most probably based on her and her sister she admits in an interview. Inspired by pre-Raphaelite females, she says her drawings are of romantic mythical females such as sylphs and sirens. Feminism and mystery with their spaced out expressions of other worldly ideas without backgrounds... they can be in a dream world with no physical reality to ground them. A lot of friends visited and some brought flower bouquets for Naomi which was very nice and appropriate for a romantic artist! She actually looks like her drawings, and her sister too. Multi-talented, she paints, dances ballet and belly dancing, reads poetry, does Poetry in Motion workshops, and goes to various studios; her sister is in film-making. Artsy Queen Street West with all its little galleries and design stores for clothing and accessories, furniture, and cafes, and bars is the perfect street for artists. Some artists have regular shows, either solo or group, along this popular street but a lot only show sporadically, when they have enough pieces to display which can take a few years between. And the old joke about starving artists and how one only makes it after death is due to a lack of publicity and production. But Naomi obviously can produce enough in her lifetime to do a solo and some of her paintings sold, which is another hurdle fine artists have to overcome -- becoming marketable. Most visual artists remain unknown unless they are in touch with the public's tastes and get publicity. If women who resemble sylphs from the Pre-Raphaelite era walk around Queen Street West, and men are attracted to their beauty, then perhaps Naomi is going to succeed commercially, as well as artistically...
