Danuta Rothschild delighted in drawing portraits of her classmates and teachers in pencil and chalks. Accepted to the prestigious Academy of Arts in Warsaw in 1969, Danuta spent the next two years rigorously developing a variety of techniques from watercolor and pastels to oils and sculpture. After settling in the United States in 1971, Danuta studied at Pierce College in Woodland Hills from 1989-1991.

An artist of considerable breadth and stature, Danuta created several series of paintings covering a wide variety of subjects. In her "Art About Art" series, she portrayed her favorite painters—Cezanne, Picasso, Rembrandt, Van Gogh, and Modigliani—combining portraits with elements of their well-known works. Half homage, half subtle mischief, these whimsical paintings are perhaps more revealing of Danuta herself than the masters she reveres.

Danuta’s "Indian Images" series was inspired by the American Southwest. Powerful strokes and somber moods vividly focus upon the inherent character and isolation of the American Native. Danuta’s social and political concerns are also expressed in paintings entitled "Storm of Madness," reflecting a series of conflicts in the Middle East, paintings on America’s urban homeless, as well as "The Forgotten Children," a project based on the plight of innocent victims of warfare and drought.

The subjects of World War II and the Holocaust are close to Danuta’s heart, and led her to paint a cycle of truly haunting works. "Silence" pays tribute to the forgotten heroes and is a passionate statement on human suffering, underscored with anguish-filled faces and ghost-like figures, taking the observer on a dark and emotionally heart-wrenching journey. Danuta’s more recent and less solemn interests include luminously rich and otherworldly landscapes, as well as portraits for which she is most widely known.

Visitors to Danuta’s Santa Monica studio are astonished by the gaiety and richness of color in so many of the exhibited works. Yet it is Danuta’s ability to capture the scope of human experience—from the ominous to the magically affirming—that makes her art so powerful. The brightly hued images of Danuta’s opus, including drawings, etchings, wall-sized portraits and sculpture, eclectically coexist amidst the bookshelves, photos, sketches, brushes and paint-boxes that portray an artist at work.

Danuta’s continuing journey of self-discovery led to a considerable change in character and subject matter of her most recent paintings. According to Danuta:

I have changed and so has my art.
The good news is I have found my key.
There are many keyholes, doors, pathways and mirrors.
I am curious and delighted with what I might experience when I encounter any of them.
Each experience is necessary to get me to the next place.
I just might ride a Tsunami or paint the sky with my brush.
I may need a ladder or a bunch of chairs or a high tension wire; but I will learn to fly.
I know one thing: I can take it!

During the past 15 years Danuta’s works were shown in museums in Poland, France, Bosnia, and the United States. A prizewinner of the Los Angeles 1998 World Contemporary Art International, Danuta participated in numerous shows in the Los Angeles, Santa Monica, Venice, Santa Barbara, and Laguna Beach galleries, appeared on TV shows in France and Poland, and was featured in several articles in magazines and daily press. Danuta’s paintings are reproduced in about a dozen different art books, and her works are collected by prestigious private collectors and institutions all over the world.