Lorena Spurio: Drawings That Reveal Joy

Lorena Spurio — profile published 2026-09-02 — builds commissions from the tiny, imperfect things most artists might skip. Her motifs — the sea, the moon, cats, casual breakfasts and first dips in the sea — repeat across her personal work until she recognises them as the core of her voice. That clarity is why magazines and papers now call: The New Yorker, The New York Times, the Financial Times and The Atlantic have all run her illustrations.

How a single drawing changed direction

Spurio was born in Reggio Calabria and has lived in Rome, Madrid, Barcelona, Milan and now Turin. She studied literature and art history, completed a Master’s in Communications and Art in 2018, then enrolled in a three-month digital illustration course. On day one she saw an Andy Warhol ink drawing, Hands on the Piano, and knew she wanted to work visually. Her teacher on that course was Pietro Puccio.

Process: thought first, then line

Her briefs start with reading. She underlines sentences that spark visual ideas, lets the themes settle, then follows the first impulses into sketches. Mind maps were tried and discarded; she now prefers to let concepts evolve internally, producing three to five sketches for an art director to choose from. Comics remain a particular love: she values the way panels create suspense and emotional pacing.

“I thought it meant big passions or hobbies,”

— Lorena Spurio on interpreting the brief “Draw what you like.” The remark captures how she moved from searching for grand themes to recognising that recurring small pleasures had already answered the question for her.

Recognition and next moves

Spurio completed a Mimaster Illustrazione in Milan in 2022. Her work has featured in the Society of Illustrators annual three years running, she was a finalist at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair and won first prize at Posterheroes. She treats awards as milestones rather than guarantees; commissions and steadiness, she notes, are separate challenges.

Looking ahead she wants to paint on a larger scale, learn Japanese and — ambitiously — train until she can do a backflip. For readers and art fans, Spurio’s career is a reminder that creative identity often lives in repetition: notice the images you keep drawing, and they’ll tell you what you love.