Laurel received her formal art training at the University of Utah and the Petersen Art Center in Salt Lake City. She studied watercolor under Harold Petersen, Carol Barnes, Arne Westerman, Alex Powers, Don Andrews, Frank Webb, Alvaro Castagnet, and other nationally known artists.

Laurel’s paintings have been hung in many national juried exhibitions including those of the American Watercolor Society, the National Watercolor Society, Rocky Mountain National, Watercolor West and the Western Federation of Watercolor Societies. Her work was published in a feature article in the September 2001 issue of The Artist’s Magazine, entitled "The Power of Suggestion." She will have a painting included in "Splash Eight" coming out in October 2004.

Laurel is a signature member of the National Watercolor Society, Watercolor West, Western Federation Society, and the Utah Watercolor Society. Her paintings have won numerous awards and can be found in private collections across the country. She is currently represented by Sixteenth Street Gallery and Williams Fine Art Gallery in Salt Lake City.

As an artist it is more important for me to paint the excitement I feel for a subject than it is to create a photorealistic rendering of it; consequently my paintings are more impressionistic than realistic. Painting for me is a way to communicate emotions that sometimes can’t be expressed through the language of words alone. I tend to work in an abbreviated style where the suggestion is more important than the completed statement. Leaving some things unsaid creates a mystery which hopefully draws the viewer into the painting, and sets up an emotional dialogue between us. My paintings are almost always about the drama of light–I particularly love subjects bathed in full sun, or those backlit in subtle rim lighting.