Drawing from both her imagination and close observation of the human figure, Gabriele Mierzwa paints intimate mixed-media nudes—typically women—in sensual postures. Interested in creating harmonious compositions, Mierzwa depicts her subjects in a predominantly pale, neutral palette, with accents of vibrant color, against soft backgrounds composed of hazy colors and lines, so that the figures’ contours appear to dissolve into their settings. In her large-scale painting Awaken (2013), a nude woman with milky white skin lies, horizontally, on her back with her eyes closed in an expression of peacefulness or post-coital pleasure.