RSA Banenr
There she glows, oil paint and acrylic paint on canvas 60 × 80cm, 2024
Bed bound, oil and acrylic paint on canvas sheet, 38 × 52cm, 2025

Laura Daly

Fine Art

My practice is deeply rooted in my experience with chronic pain and scoliosis, manifesting through an exploration of the human figure. Through painting and drawing, I investigate the body, translating personal bodily limitations into a broader inquiry into disability studies and the sociological implications of aesthetics.

My work critiques a world designed for the able-bodied, emphasizing the physical and attitudinal barriers that create ‘disablement.’ Playing with heightened colour saturation, using neon hues alongside subdued flesh tones allows me to exaggerate bodily discomfort and the tension between inner sensation and outward presentation.

Through materiality and form, my work fosters conversations about perception, embodiment, and the intersection of art and activism. By intentionally distorting and manipulating the body in my work, I subvert traditional ideals of beauty and perfection, instead highlighting the lived experience of disability and pain. My use of colour as an emotional device further amplifies these themes, evoking sensations of restriction, discomfort, and resilience. In doing so, my work not only asserts the validity of disabled bodies within contemporary art but also critiques how mainstream visual culture erases, objectifies, or medicalizes them. By engaging with these themes, my practice functions as both a personal exploration and a broader commentary on disability as a social and political identity, pushing for a more inclusive and diverse representation of embodiment in art.

Now you see me, acrylic paintings on an acrylic sheet and cartridge paper, hanging from metal brackets with wire, 42 × 29cm (x2), 2024
Burden of the body, oil and acrylic paint on canvas sheet, 38 × 52cm, 2025
Contorted blues, oil paint and acrylic paint on canvas, 60 × 80cm, 2025

Reading School of Art