Maria Brzozowska

She studied Visual Communication at Leeds Arts University, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in 2013, and completed a Master of Fine Arts in Media and Design at Bilkent University, Ankara, in 2016. From 2017 to 2023 she taught in Bilkent’s Department of Communication and Design. This background places her work at the intersection of painting, illustration and visual storytelling.

Her painting process begins with abstract backgrounds, a limited initial palette and marks that gradually develop into scenes. The composition evolves as she works, allowing associations to emerge beyond the original sketch. In 2025 she introduced oil into her acrylic practice and explored larger canvases and the diptych format.

In her reading of the work, curator Catriona McAra connects these imaginary gardens with Bosch and surrealist artists including Leonora Carrington, Dorothea Tanning and Remedios Varo. She also identifies links with fairy tales and illustrated books. Thresholds, islands and suspended structures turn each scene into a place of passage, where personal discovery can take the form of a fantastic transformation.

Illustration is a parallel strand of her practice. In this field she combines hand-painted textures with digital tools to develop characters and narrative settings. In 2014 her series The Ape, The Snake and The Lion received an Applied Arts award in the Young Blood Illustration — Series category. Her career also includes selections in the Cheltenham, Ludicomix and Tapirulan illustration competitions.

She has presented solo exhibitions in Ankara, Istanbul, Leeds and Madrid. In 2018 she returned to Leeds Arts University with The Seven Layers of a Dream. Her group exhibitions include Plate It Please at the Vista Alegre Museum in Portugal, the Arte Laguna Prize exhibition in Venice in 2024 and the exhibition organized by the same prize at EKA Tianwu, Shanghai, in 2025.

At Marquesa Gallery she presented Magic in Bloom, curated by Dr Catriona McAra and held from March 7 to May 17, 2025. The exhibition brought together her world of gardens, characters and metamorphoses in a reflection on femininity and change. The accompanying curatorial essay, Gardens of Delight, explored the connections between her painting, surrealism and literary imagination.