Dreamscape with Two Birds, 2025

Augustina Droze  

In “Dreamscape with Two Birds", deep blues dominate the composition: vibrant orchids and an elegant iris emerge from a dense floral thicket. The arrangement evokes a sense of Rococo abundance. Two small birds nestle within the foliage. Their yellow plumage provides a striking contrast to the cool tones. Each feather is rendered with precise, rhythmic detail. This artwork blends Eastern and Western influences into a singular vision. It presents a world that feels both exotic and intimate. The atmosphere is dreamlike. Nature is reimagined as a symbolic sanctuary. Droze utilizes a rich palette to create depth and movement. Light dances across the petals and wings. The composition balances chaotic growth with a refined sense of harmony. This 2025 painting captures a moment of serene bewilderment. The gaze is drawn from the luminous center to the darker edges of the garden. Every brushstroke contributes to a modern mythology. The scene concludes with a soft transition into warm, earthy orange hues at the base.

The contemporary artist Augustina Droze uses animals as symbols to describe her personal lived experiences. Her current body of work explores her life as a foreigner, her gaze upon the world as exotic, beautiful and bewildering. As an expat living in Beijing for the past ten years and currently in Barcelona, Droze's work incorporates elements of East and West. Her swirling, dream-like paintings are colourful and confrontational, brimming with Rococo inspired abundance. She creates her own modern mythology, a storybook land where she is the other in a very other worldly landscape. Droze has exhibited in galleries and museums internationally in numerous shows, notably the Castellani Art Museum, Niagara Falls, New York (2014), Banaras Hindu University as Fulbright Senior Scholar, Varanasi, India (2017), the Beijing US Embassy as Distinguished Art Envoy (2022), London Biennale (2023), Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum (2024) and Carrousel du Louvre (2025).