Dark and Soft Can Be One: Mya Denize’s Florals, Femininity, and the Role of Process by Georgia Stewart

In Mya Denize’s art, we see bleeding colors and blurred edges on raw canvas, depicting flowers and nature somewhere between blooming and decay. These florals don't behave like typical flowers; they are soft but not delicate, and light but also heavy. Mya Denize paints florals and botanicals that feel more emotional than decorative, expressing femininity in a moody, complex way. This tension defines Mya’s work and unfolds through her physically and emotionally involved process.

This week, I had the pleasure of meeting and speaking with Mya Denize, a North Carolina-based artist whose work transforms florals and nature into something fluid, emotional, and difficult to define. Coming from a military family, Mya has moved around for most of her life. She grew up in Germany and has experienced many different cultures and environments. A large part of Mya’s life, and a major source of her inspiration, is her spirituality and connection to nature. Mya uses her art as a healing, meditative process that portrays her relationship to her emotions, feminine side, and the natural world around her. 

Florals are a traditional symbol of women, beauty, fertility, and femininity. In this traditional context, they are typically depicted as soft, delicate, passive objects. At first glance, Mya’s work may seem to align with this idea, but certain aspects of it don’t allow the viewer to fully commit to that interpretation. These florals have deep, rich colors, they fade in and out of Mya’s constructed atmosphere, and they bleed into a sea of shape and color. 

Mya’s use of darker, sometimes muted tones complicates the initial feeling of softness that her florals exude. Mya describes this as her exploration of the less visible archetypes of femininity and the complexity of being a woman. Mya’s work shows the viewer that this softness and darkness can coexist in a very harmonious way, presenting femininity and her internal dialogue as layered rather than singular. This makes her expression of femininity become something emotional, unstable, and complex. 

“Exploring the darker, arcane, and moody attributes of femininity. A world where soft and dark can be one.” 

Mya’s subject matter is chosen very intuitively and driven by feeling. Certain florals and colors often correspond with her emotional state when she is creating, and the surrealist imagery often emerges during her process rather than being designed. Her intuitive process allows her paintings to feel and be fully organic, as if they, too, grow into being like the nature they depict. 

Mya describes her process as a “dance” she does with the canvas. Her whole body is involved in making each piece; she changes her physical relationship with it as she works, moving around it and sometimes standing above it. Mya will sometimes abandon a piece for a few days or longer  until she feels connected to its rhythm again. This process allows her to be fully engaged and prevents her work from becoming too rigid or controlled. She is able to create a physical connection not only with her work but also with the process, as it becomes a meditative yet active experience for her. Here, femininity and emotion are expressed as fluid, embodied, and active. 

Oftentimes, Mya will switch between a raw or primed canvas to achieve different results and experiences when creating. The raw canvas allows her colors to absorb and bleed into one another, creating a softer look. Mya enjoys experimenting with how using and not using different materials can affect the texture and emotional outcome of a piece. The softness Mya achieves with her unprimed canvases enhances the visual and physical experience her paintings create, adding to the contradicting expressions of her emotions and femininity.

Even with the intense connection Mya’s work has to her mind and spirit, she does not impose a specific meaning on it. Rather, she wants viewers to create their own connections to the florals she depicts. The openness and ambiguity of her work are intentional. Just like femininity and each person’s connection to their emotions and the world around them, meaning lacks a singular definition. Mya’s work invites personal emotional connection with each viewer it interacts with.

Like emotions, femininity, and one's relationship to the external world, Mya’s work is fluid and unstable. She presents femininity as unfixed and resistant to definition and characterization. Her work and her process remain unresolved, hovering between states and remaining in motion through her intuitive, emotionally immediate process. As Mya puts it, “no piece is ever finished,” meaning rather than them ending, they are just paused in a moment of her expression. The viewer is part of this ongoing process, as meaning can continue to shift with each encounter and remain in a state of becoming.  

See more of Mya on her social media: 

Instagram: @art.by.mke 

TikTok: @myamkeart