“Find people who encourage you and take your ideas and your dreams seriously. If you can’t find them in your family or at your school, keep looking.”
Q & A with writer, artist, and creative coach Lauren Sarat
Thanks for joining us at Ocean State Stories, Lauren. Let’s start with the numerous services you offer. Please tell us about your visual and expressive arts workshops.
Firstly, thank you so much for the honor of sharing my story with you.
Over the course of my career, I have had the privilege of working across different creative fields. During the pandemic of 2020, I found myself isolated in my home alone, hungry for a social outlet during the quarantine period. Everything was closed, the library, bookstores, the gym, but MoonStone Art Studio in Warwick’s Governor Francis Farm Plaza, stayed open. I walked into my first class thinking I could only draw stick figures. Two months later, the teacher encouraged me to trust my instincts and basically turned me loose in the studio. “You know what you’re doing,” she told me, and while I didn’t believe her at the time, eventually I came to see she was on to something.
I ended up taking to the visual arts like a fish to water. I was already enrolled in the graduate counseling program at Salve Regina University and decided to add a CAGS (certificate of advanced graduate studies, a post-master’s degree) in Expressive and Creative Arts. I graduated from both programs in 2023. That May, I had my first one-woman show at MoonStone called “Birth of a New Sun,” and was incredibly surprised to sell seven paintings there.
Since then, I have participated in a couple of group shows, one at the Warwick Center for the Arts, and an artist residency in 2025 at the Creative Reuse Center in East Providence that culminated in a final project entitled, “Your Secrets Are Safe with Me/Are My Secrets Safe with You?”
After facilitating workshops for adults at the Warwick Center for the Arts and MoonStone Art Studio, I began running regular expressive arts workshops in group-home settings for adolescents referred by DCYF in February 2025. I love working with youth and encouraging them to use their artistic voices, no matter what the medium. Here’s an example of a “Frustration Collage,” by a group participant from last fall:
What about your writing, editing, and book consultation?
My early professional background is in the publishing industry. Prior to graduating from Sarah Lawrence College with an MFA in Fiction Writing, I worked as a bookseller in Amherst, Massachusetts, Bronxville, New York, and in Manhattan. After my MFA, I worked as an assistant editor with St. Martin’s Press and its literary imprint, Picador USA. I then transitioned to life in a literary agency called Sobel Weber Associates.
I took this background with me into teaching when I was offered the chance to teach creative writing at Rutgers University. After moving to Rhode Island, I taught at Brown University for a decade, in addition to Rhode Island College, Emerson College, and University of Connecticut. I still teach creative writing through small-group workshops for adults, one of which has been meeting continuously over Zoom since early 2020.
Because of my background in publishing, many of my adult students in the former Continuing Education program at Brown sought me out for consultation. That’s when I started working one-on-one to help writers develop their projects, whether it’s a short story, an article, a book, or a one-man monologue. Over twenty years later, I’ve never had to advertise for these services, since people find me through word of mouth.
And artist statements, creative confidence coaching and retreats?
Periodically, I am asked to help artists find words for the visual work they do. Creative coaching is the term I use to combine both the expressive arts and the writing consultation services that I offer. I am hoping to firm up plans to offer a day-long writing retreat on Prudence Island.
You also offer original art for sale. What specifically?
In addition to the paintings I sold at my one-woman show, I offer prints of the swans I began painting two years ago. I also accept commissions. Below are two images that sold in the recent small-works holiday show at The HeARTspot Gallery in East Providence.
We always ask about backgrounds. Where did you grow up and what schools did you attend (and degrees earned)?
I was born in Providence but left when I was two. My family moved often while my father established his career as a professor. He eventually landed at Amherst College, in Amherst, Massachusetts, which is where I attended junior high school and high school. My BA is in Religion from Oberlin College, where I graduated with High Honors. I currently hold three graduate degrees and one day, I would like to complete a Ph.D.
When did your interest in art and writing first surface?
My father taught me to read when I was two-and-a-half years old, so books are basically part of my genetic makeup at this point. My mother gave me my first notebook when I was eight. I’ve been writing nonstop ever since.
My mother was an accomplished painter, although she stopped when she went to Yale for law school. I took photography courses in high school and after college. Whenever I traveled, I spent a lot of time in art museums, and while living in NYC, I drank up the art on offer all around me. It wasn’t until recently that my own serious visual art practice really took off.
And counseling?
For myself, creative expression and mental wellbeing have always gone hand-in-hand. My honors thesis at Oberlin investigated Freud’s critique of religion. I read everything he wrote as background research for that paper and studied Carl Jung’s work. While in college, I worked at a battered women’s shelter, and have always been interested in counseling. It wasn’t until recently that I found the time to complete my degree. I use the skills I learned through my clinical field work in mental health all the time in my coaching and consulting. Rather than becoming a professional counselor, I decided to work alongside mental health services through the arts instead of pursuing licensure as a psychotherapist.
What advice would you offer young people interested in pursuing art or writing?
Be patient. Find people who encourage you and take your ideas and your dreams seriously. If you can’t find them in your family or at your school, keep looking. There are plenty of arts organizations and informal art groups where you can find the support you need. Lastly, trust the process. It never takes where you think you’ll go, but it always leads you where you most need to go and into areas where you most need to grow.
You are so busy! How do you relax?
I am very blessed to spend time almost every day at a private horse farm on 50 acres in Warren. We are regularly visited by flocks of wild geese and turkeys, and a couple of herds of deer have made that land their home. Helping with barn chores, spending time with the horses, and with my three dogs keeps me grounded and close to nature.
What’s next?
I am currently working on a manuscript tentatively titled, Finding the Missing Peace, inspired by the Substack writing I started last June. The book blends memoir, depth psychology, and mythology with discussions about the craft of writing. I hope to finish that project within the year.
You can read my work at laurensarat.substack.com and find out more about my services at www.laurensarat.com.
