New Orleans painter Leslie Staub is best known for her series of Louisiana cultural and political figures rendered in a style reminiscent of Orthodox Church icons. These paintings are often framed with gilded and jeweled borders, and embellished with satin and fringe. The seemingly naive style of Leslie Staub’s portraits of Southern cultural icons and creatures belies her expansive worldview, in which all living things embody the divinity of creation. Less well known are her atmospheric, abstract-realist depictions of animals and birds in oil and acrylic media on canvas, and a series of humorous cartoonish creatures with titles that pose questions about morality. Since 2000, Staub has expanded into writing and illustrating children’s books.