Natacha Donzé
Swiss Art Award Laureate 2023
The Swiss artist Natacha Donzé (*1991 in Boudevilliers, CH) is known for her powerful and experimental paintings. Her works are often characterized by intense colors, expressive lines, and a blend of figuration and abstraction, which she brings to the canvas through airbrush techniques. Her visual language plays with forms that seem both familiar and strange, drawing viewers into an in-between world.
A distinctive feature of her art is the combination of humorous and grotesque elements. Her works invite reflection on human existence in a modern, often bewildering world. With pieces like Do you love me, 2022, and Pain release II, 2022, she explores emotional inner worlds, underscoring her interest in interpersonal themes.
Other visual motifs, such as Murmuration, choreography, 2022, evoke thermal images, aerial, or satellite views, suggesting abstracted landscapes or unfamiliar topographies. These elements resemble a mapping of emotions or states of consciousness, offering a compelling metaphor for inner life and subjective experiences beneath the surface. At the same time, they evoke associations with drone footage from crisis zones, prompting a critical examination of the power structures within today’s institutional, political, and economic systems.
Natacha Donzé’s fascination with the major and minor phenomena of the present is contagious, and we are excited to accompany this young artist on her journey.
In August 2022, during a studio visit with Natacha Donzé, we had the opportunity to observe the creation of the work Murmuration, choreography, 2022.