"Melody Beneath the Banyan Tree" Painting

I’m Stephanie Künzli Ycaza, a Swiss-Ecuadorian artist living and working near Basel, Switzerland. My work explores the emotional and symbolic connection between nature and femininity. Through textured layers, earthy tones, and dreamlike compositions, I aim to tell visual stories that speak to strength, vulnerability, transformation, and ancestral memory.

My artistic language combines abstract landscapes with figurative elements – especially feminine forms that emerge organically from the surface. These women are not portraits, but archetypes: silent warriors, spiritual beings, or elemental guardians who carry emotions we often cannot put into words.

I work intuitively, guided by feeling and material. Using a blend of plaster, pigment, acrylic, oils, gold, and natural textures, I create surfaces that feel both ancient and raw, yet timeless and intimate. I’m deeply inspired by geology, mythology, and inner worlds — my paintings often feel like fragments of memory or places we've dreamed before.

Art, for me, is a quiet dialogue between the visible and the invisible. I invite the viewer to pause and enter these visual spaces, to reflect, connect, and perhaps recognize something familiar within.