Title: Wild Eden

About This Work:

This painting is part of my Wild Beauty at Risk series, inspired by my artist residency at AIR Ubud in Bali. After receiving a grant from the Manitoba Arts Council just before the pandemic lockdown, I waited two years before finally travelling to Bali in April 2022.

The AIR Ubud residency was extraordinary. Our river room had soaring ceilings and wide windows opening directly into the jungle, and the community studio where I painted every day was open to the rainforest on one side. Surrounded by the lush sights, sounds, and scents of the jungle, I immersed myself in the wonder of this tropical environment.

During the residency, I created large 9-foot drawings and paintings on nylon and Tyvek, experimenting with local dyes that change colour in sunlight and traditional sustainable dyes made from native plants and trees. I allowed the staining of dyes on nylon to bleed into the Tyvek, creating rich, abstract foundations for my work.

I sketched at every opportunity—hiking into rainforest gorges, pausing for a cool drink, wandering through the sacred Monkey Forest, and exploring waterfalls with my family on weekends. One unforgettable sketching session even happened during a torrential downpour, deep in a rainforest gorge by the river.

The focus of this project was to record the remnants of once-great tropical jungles. I want viewers to fall in love with the awe-inspiring beauty of the jungle—and to care enough to preserve and protect what remains.

These paintings are a love letter to the tropical jungles, both the ones I explored in the Eastern Java-Bali Rainforest in Indonesia and the ones I carry within me from my childhood in the Congo. They are born of gratitude, urgency, and wonder: an invitation to fall in love with the wild beauty that remains, and to fight for its survival.

You can purchase this card to send a message to your friends or if you purchase 4 individual cards, I will put them in a clear gift box for you to give to someone special.

How it Was Made:

This digital print is a reproduction of the original painting printed locally on high-quality card stock. 

Size Variations:
5 x 7 inches (comes in an 8x10 mat)
8 x 10 inches (comes in an 11x14 mat)

This digital reproduction print comes with a white mat and illustration board backing, in a clear protective covering. It will be shipped flat to your address unless you are local.

For Winnipeg orders please select “PICK UP” in step 2 of the checkout process to bypass shipping costs.

Follow my art adventure on Instagram @cornelius.karen

Karen Cornelius holds the Copyright on all her artwork. No image may be reproduced for any reason without the consent of the artist.