MÓNIKA KÁRÁNDI

Mónika Kárándi (b. 1990, Debrecen, Hungary) is a painter based in Budapest. She received her degree from the Hungarian University of Fine Arts.

Kárándi’s paintings fuse figurative and abstract elements within expansive, immersive, oneiric compositions, grounded in an ecofeminist sensibility that takes human and non-human entanglement as its primary pictorial language. Her work is characterised by a fluid interplay of organic, bodily forms and amorphous environments that oscillate between dystopian and utopian registers, rendered through layered surfaces and a vibrant, almost radioactive colour palette.

Working in oil and acrylic, Kárándi develops her compositions through an intuitive, process-led approach in which gestures accumulate and overlap. The resulting tactile surfaces are dense and atmospheric. Recurring motifs—ruinous architectural fragments and floral, plant-like bodies entwined within alien, otherworldly wind-swept landscapes, from arid deserts to dense jungles —construct a dreamlike world that feels at once archaic and speculative. These scenes hover between a paradise already lost and a not-so-distant future marked by ecological collapse, while also invoking a kind of Donna Haraway-ian entanglement, in which new forms of coexistence and survival begin to emerge.

More recently, Kárándi has expanded her practice into embroidered textiles, extending this visual language into a different material register. These works draw on personal and autobiographical references alongside broader mythological and folkloric narratives, unfolding as sequences of recurring symbols and episodic scenes. At the same time, her engagement with embroidery reflects on its history as a gendered, domestic craft, subtly challenging its position within the hierarchy of artistic media.

Selected recent solo and duo exhibitions include Deep Inside in the Safest Place (with Erin M. Riley), Longtermhandstand, Budapest (2025); Just A Matter Of Time, Ojiri Gallery, London (2024); Remember where we started out, Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles (2023); I Come Home in the Morning Light, Ojiri Gallery, London (2022); and Just a perfect day! (with Attila Bagi), Longtermhandstand, Budapest (2022). Important recent institutional group exhibitions include Intertwined, Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest (2025); Plant Kingdom, Budapest Gallery, Budapest (2022); and Esterházy Art Award Short List 2021 Ludwig Museum – Museum of Contemporary Art, Budapest (2021–2022), among others. Her works are held in public institutional collections, including the National Gallery in Budapest and the Deji Art Museum in Nanjing.