Muse with Rabbits, 2025

Augustina Droze  

In “Muse with Rabbits" by Augustina Droze, a surreal encounter unfolds within a dreamlike landscape. A majestic lion dominates the scene. Its fur transforms into delicate blue and white porcelain patterns. This unexpected fusion blends strength with fragile elegance. Pink rabbits swarm the creature. They climb its back and gather at its paws. Their soft hues contrast sharply against the cool tones of the feline. 
The composition vibrates with a Rococo sense of abundance. Lush vegetation and colourful blooms fill the foreground. In the distance, soft mountains meet a deep blue sky. The scene evokes a modern mythology where the exotic and the familiar collide. Each element serves as a symbolic narrator. The tension between the predator and the prey vanishes. It is replaced by a whimsical harmony. Droze merges Eastern aesthetic influences with Western traditions. This creates a world that feels both bewildering and beautiful. The gaze of the lion remains fierce yet static. It anchors the swirling energy of the surrounding animals. Every brushstroke emphasizes the tactile quality of the porcelain skin. The light catches the curves of the lion's mane and the velvet texture of the rabbits. The painting concludes with a vivid display of floral details.

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).