Valerie Auersperg is an Austrian artist living in New Zealand who creates acrylic paintings as well as digital drawings depicting pop-surreal scenes in a colourful, dream-like manner. Auersperg explores the world inside and around herself, pairing the expected with the unusual. She focuses on themes such as memory (real and perceived), pop culture and mental health. Her work is a whimsical commentary on how our inner journeys, moods and situations are something that connects us.

Auersperg’s paintings always start with a memory, a mood or just a nostalgic feeling. Living far away from where she grew up informs these recollections of home and comfort. She then weaves these into scenes of optimism and escapism adding little delightful details such as smiley faces, flamingos, balloons, 90s memorabilia, etc to her paintings, aiming to evoke a feeling of joy and wonder and put a smile on the observer’s face.