Mia Nelle Drøschler | The Forest Within

About

Drøschler's new paintings present a fantastical landscape vision, combing relationships of contemporary urban psyche with prehistory and nature.

Drøschler has an interest in trying to embrace places in the world that are remote, where it is still possible to experience the chaos of primal feelings. In autumn 2010 she visited the forests of Borneo, actively trekking for days and experiencing fauna and animals in their relatively untouched natural environment. Her paintings deal with this place and also engage the edges of the human mind. She is aware of Freudian references within her work, making the painting very personal, however there is also a sense of overwhelming focus for exploration of our collective and now anxious psyche.

Her work deals with highly ethical and difficult issues, such our concerns for the global health of the natural world. Her focus on nature re-emphasises her concern for animal and ecological welfare, while at the same time it acknowledges the shift that the destruction nature causes within our own minds. The paintings seem to pose questions that challenge the well-known archetypes of dream images; one feels that within these paining these archetypes are at peril.

While the paintings present us with this extraordinary world of images, they are also played out with challenging and exquisite paintwork. The strong colours and large scale of these 10 paintings confirms that we have pushed our world and minds to an absurd place.