Laura Jane Petelko is a distinguished photographer celebrated for her painterly approach, where she combines abstraction with emotional depth. Her work has been exhibited internationally, with significant recognition at institutions like Christie’s, where it was featured in the preview of The Eye of the Collector. Notably, she has collaborated with the National Ballet of Canada, incorporating elements of movement and grace. She is also a regular presence at major art fairs, including Photo London and the London Art Fair, where her work continues to attract attention from global audiences.

Petelko studied and worked as a master printer for west coast based photographic artists such as Harmony Korine, Kelly Wood, Roy Arden and Ed Rusche. There, she was represented by Vancouver’s “Third Avenue Gallery” for several years before moving back to Toronto.

Currently, she is exhibiting her latest series MA and Phototropic. Created during the pandemic, in collaboration with dancers from the National Ballet Of Canada. This work explores universally human themes and struggles. The beauty and mystery involved in uncertain times, transformation and emergence. It has been shown at Photo London, Eye Of the Collector, Cavalier Gallery, Palm Beach & New York City, GBS Fine Art in the Uk, as well as having been featured in Park Magazine/ Spring 2022.

Her enigmatic “Soft Stories' was photographed between 2016 and 2019, explores the duality between our longing for connection with nature and the flawed, poetic ways we might go about that. As well as, on a basic level, a need for comfort and protection. This project was produced in collaboration with multidisciplinary artist Sara Wood, who helped imagine and created the creatures for the collaboration. “Soft Stories” was featured in Times Sqaure as part of Cube Fair, Scope Fair Miami in 2019 and in Blank Spaces magazine following her solo exhibition in Toronto, late 2019, as well as several solo exhibitions.

Petelko’s work over 25 years, has been known for its emotive sincerity, intimate and tender subject matter. Following a 3 year period of being faced with the prognosis of impending blindness, she began to use of in-camera abstraction to remove information in order to heighten and leave what she feels is essential to the feeling an image is seeking to imply. At the same time, moving out of the limits of photography’s typical relationship with information, resolution and detail.

Laura Jane Petelko’s work has been recognized and exhibited throughout Canada, the US and Europe. With collectors worldwide.