Paradise Found, 2024
Mixed media on canvas
3.5 ft x 5 ft
Edition 1/1 original
Unframed
Provenance: Acquired directly from the artist, Toronto
Includes delivery and installation within the Toronto area
In Paradise Found, sensuality and spirituality intertwine in a dreamlike tangle of saturated greens, soft pinks, and raw intimacy. Two lovers fold into one another—limbs intertwined, gazes locked—as peace doves hover above and the phrase “Lover: Surrogate” floats between devotion and irony. The lush, Edenic backdrop suggests stillness, but nothing here is passive. Featured in The Green Contemporaries, Queeny’s 2025 solo exhibition at Mania Contemporary, this work reclaims paradise as a site of power, vulnerability, and ecstatic truth.
About The Artist
Queeny Rebel Empire is the alter ego of Toronto artist Ursula Queeny Krubnik—a painter, graffiti alum, and self-described “visual sociologist” whose work radiates defiance, joy, and deep-rooted feminine power. Raised by Eastern Bloc immigrants and shaped by the underground art scene of the late ’80s and ’90s, Queeny merges raw grit with playful mysticism. Her paintings—often built on salvaged materials—are ecstatic, story-rich worlds of bright color, divine feminine energy, and found-object alchemy. With The Green Contemporaries (April 25–May 23rd, 2025), Mania proudly presents our first solo show by a female artist—an artist whose work doesn’t just speak to rebellion, but paints it in full bloom.
