Lauren Shapiro’s art is a conversation between time, nature and human impact. Rooted in the landscapes of South Florida, her work fuses ceramics, 3D technology, and science to explore fragile ecosystems and our place within them. Lauren's latest project, Pastiche, at Vizcaya Museum and Gardens (on view until May 19, 2025), invites communities into an ancient space for environmental dialogue and reflection on our role in preserving what is both ephemeral and enduring.
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Lauren Shapiro | Photo by Camilla Smith
For Lauren Shapiro, the connection to South Florida is deeply personal. Growing up on the edge of the Everglades, the artist was struck by the stark divide between urban sprawl and the untamed wilderness.
“It was always kind of weird to me that the Everglades was such a huge part of South Florida, yet we’re so disconnected from it,” Lauren reflects.
This dissonance lies at the heart of her artistic practice, driving her to reclaim a sense of place and foster environmental stewardship. A master ceramicist and passionate educator, Lauren’s career bridges art, science, technology, and community, creating immersive works, workshops, and community-based projects that invite audiences to explore their relationship with the fragile natural world.
“In Miami and South Florida, it’s kind of like the ecosystem is eating back into us,” Lauren observes. Her art begs exploration of this delicate coexistence, asking how humans and nature can harmonize within a landscape in flux.
“People love clay. I wanted to invite them into this process where they could touch the material and feel like they were part of something bigger.”
Lauren’s work, Temporary Terrains and Garden Portals (2019) at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden and “Future Pacific” (2020) at Bakehouse Art Complex truly exemplified her ethos. Through a series of collaborative workshops for the general public, everyone could participate in modeling the clay into the molds.
For Temporary Terrains, Lauren also collaborated closely with field biologists, who specialize in conservation ecology. These scientists helped her identify and understand plant species and their connections to the ecosystems in which they thrive. Lauren then collected samples and cast imprints of the flora in silica-free silicone to create molds for her installation.
“Scientists can be reserved, but when you find those who love art, the overlap is incredible.”
During a residency in French Polynesia, she encountered scientists using 3D mapping to study coral reefs. Inspired, Lauren incorporated these technologies into her practice: “It’s really interesting to blend new and old technology. Ceramics is one of the oldest tools we’ve ever used, and it’s still relevant today.”
Her coral-inspired works, such as Site R16 Transect One on South Beach, honor fragile ecosystems while celebrating their ephemeral beauty. One such ecosystem, Rapture Reef in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands’ French Frigate Shoals, was destroyed in 2018 by a hurricane intensified by climate change. Using 3D photogrammetry scans created by marine ecologists, Lauren molded and cast a representation of this now-extinct coral population. The resulting dimensional clay tiles, stacked within a gold-framed monolith, bring the submerged world to land, resurrecting it.
“The corals I capture are a moment in time, frozen into ceramic,” she explains. “It’s a way of preserving something that’s disappearing every day.”
Pastiche by Lauren Shapiro | On view till May 19, 2025
Beyond aesthetics, Lauren’s work carries a message of environmental preservation and collective responsibility. Her public art projects are purposely accessible, encouraging participants to feel a sense of ownership.
“I'm interested in civic engagement and civic spaces where people have a little bit of pride about the spaces they share because they helped to create it. I think the same goes for our environment. If we feel like the environment belongs to us, we’ll take better care of it.”
Lauren is currently an artist-in-residence at Bakehouse Art Complex, a Wynwood-based incubator for artists. Her latest project, Pastiche at Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, draws parallels between endangered ecosystems and vulnerable architecture.
“Vizcaya wasn’t built for the harsh South Florida environment,” she notes. “It’s in danger of being swallowed by the ocean, much like the natural ecosystems I work with.”
The exhibition celebrates Vizcaya’s artistic advisor, Paul Chalfin (1874–1959), and it blends traditional craftsmanship with modern techniques. Lauren’s approach to studying Chalfin mirrors her methods of studying nature. Whereas she typically explores the Everglades and the ocean to gather her source material, for this project, Lauren turned to Chalfin’s contributions at Vizcaya, particularly his use of pastiche: the blending of styles and influences to create a cohesive whole.
Pastiche by Lauren Shapiro | On view till May 19, 2025
Lauren activated three public rooms with sculptures and digital installations. The resulting vessels, with their neon pinks, blues, and greens, evoke the past while resonating with the present. And by employing advanced 3D printing technologies to create plastic molds, she replaced the laborious, centuries-old technique to cast glass.
“I’m fascinated by the idea of deep time. Florida was formed millions of years ago by an ancient coral reef. The entire area was once about five or six feet underwater and part of a massive reef system. Essentially, we are living on land shaped by multiple mass extinctions over Earth's history — and now, we’re accelerating another extinction event.
Human beings are only here for such a tiny, fleeting moment compared to the life of the Earth. The planet will recover — it always does — but we might not be here to see it. Maybe humanity will be somewhere else, off-planet, or just gone entirely.
So, preserving the environment now feels like a selfish act in some ways. I want to have it around because I find it beautiful. We’re here for such a precious, short amount of time. It’s important to preserve what’s beautiful and precious about our planet.
What gives me hope: life will come back — even if it takes millions of years. It always does.”
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