"Space Monkey" Painting

Erika Vrdoljak is a painter and graphic designer working across commercial and artistic fields. She won a worldwide competition organized by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) with her logo design for a UNHCR initiative. Her work What IF was selected among the winning projects of the Talent Lab competition by Vogue CS magazine and the fashion brand Medicine, resulting in her own fashion collection. Her NFT artwork has also been exhibited on the iconic digital screens of Times Square in New York, reaching an international audience.
Her artistic practice is rooted in abstract expressive painting characterized by vivid neon colors and material experimentation. She often incorporates unconventional materials such as adhesive tape, textiles, and plastic, creating a tactile and physical dimension within abstraction. Inspired by her roots in Ptenín in the southern Pilsen region, her work reflects authenticity, memory, and a search for sincerity in contemporary life.

In her practice, Erika distinguishes between two main forms of work. Her traditional paintings are created with physical materials and mixed media. In parallel, she creates digital paintings, where expressive gesture, layered color, and brush-like digital strokes form dynamic compositions. These works are printed on aluminum, where light and viewing angle transform the surface, giving the images a shifting and vibrant character.

All works are created without the use of AI, based entirely on her own manual process, whether in physical painting or digital creation.