VDA EXHIBITION HALLS "TITANIKAS" / VDA PARODŲ ERDVĖS „TITANIKAS“

03 10 2024 – 02 11 2024

The Vilnius Painting Triennial is an international event with deep traditions, held every three years since 1969. This year's triennial places special emphasis on the Nordic countries (Sweden, Finland, Norway, Denmark), the Baltic countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania), and Poland. These are the countries whose artists are perhaps the quickest to respond to events happening around us and across the world.

The overall tone of the triennial is focused on the latest and most innovative trends in painting, aiming to understand and conceptualize the "contemporaneity" of modern painting, and to showcase the diversity and evolution of artistic reflections within the medium of painting. This triennial raises the question: Can painting, as a medium, fulfill the purpose of art—to encourage critical thinking, to enlighten, and to educate?

The collections of Baltic artists and nominees for the Nordic-Baltic Young Artists Award are exhibited at Vilnius academy of arts exhibition halls "Titanikas"

Vilniaus tapybos trienalė yra tarptautinis renginys su giliomis tradicijomis, vykstantis kas trejus metus nuo 1969-ųjų. Šių metų trienalėje ypatingas dėmesys skiriamas Šiaurės šalims (Švedija, Suomija, Norvegija, Danija), Baltijos šalims (Estija, Latvija, Lietuva) ir Lenkijai. Tai šalys, kurių menininkai bene greičiausiai reaguoja į aplink mus ir visame pasaulyje vykstančius įvykius.

Bendras trienalės tonas sutelktas į naujausias ir novatoriškiausias tapybos tendencijas, siekiant suvokti ir konceptualizuoti šiuolaikinės tapybos „dabartiškumą“, parodyti tapybos medijos meninių refleksijų įvairovę ir kismą. Ši trienalė kelia klausimą: ar tapyba, kaip medija, įgali atlikti meno paskirtį - skatinti kritinį mąstymą, šviesti ir edukuoti?

Baltijos šalių menininkų darbus bei Šiaurės ir Baltijos šalių jaunųjų menininkų apdovanojimų nominantų kūriniai eksponuojami Vilniaus dailės akademijos parodų erdvėse „Titanikas“.

Curators / kuratoriai: assoc. prof. Meda Norbutaitė (LT), Andra Orn (EE), Arvydas Žalpys (LT)

the Nominees for the Nordic-Baltic Young Artists Award

“This exhibition captures the essence of contemporary painting in the Nordic and Baltic regions, highlighting recent trends and innovative approaches to painting as an intermediary medium. The featured artists explore personal and socio-cultural narratives, delving into themes of identity, cultural heritage, social phenomena, and the evolving relationship between humans and their environment. Influenced by today’s socio-political landscape, these works balance existential melancholy with the exploration of social and personal questions.”

„Ši paroda atspindi Šiaurės ir Baltijos šalių šiuolaikinės tapybos esmę, išryškina naujausias tendencijas ir novatorišką požiūrį į tapybą kaip mediją. Menininkai tyrinėja asmeninius ir sociokultūrinius naratyvus, gilindamiesi į tapatybės, kultūrinio paveldo, socialinių reiškinių ir nuolat kintančio žmogaus ir aplinkos santykio temas. Kūriniai, paveikti šiandienos socialinio-politinio kraštovaizdžio, laviruoja tarp egzistencinės melancholijos ir socialinių bei asmeninių klausimų nagrinėjimo.“

Curator / kuratorė: Andra Orn (EE)

ADOMAS RYBAKOVAS

Vilnius, Lithuania

Adomas Rybakovas is a Lithuanian artist who blends visual and textual materials from various sources to create vibrant, large-format paintings. His work explores themes of dance culture, neo-tribes, and the human need for communal experiences..

This project intertwines personal experiences with media fragments, creating multi-figure compositions that blur the lines between aggression and pleasure. The bright, “chemical” colors evoke dance and club culture, addressing themes of crowd dynamics and ritualistic gatherings.

MARLEEN SUVI

Tallinn, Estonia

Marleen Suvi’s work examines the relationship between body and soul, often through self-portraits and haikus.

This piece captures the human experience through a blend of materials, reflecting on memory, fantasy, and desire. It invites viewers to explore the paradox of human existence through a fusion of personal and universal themes.

ANDREA MARGÓ ROTENBERG

Tallin, Estonia

Andrea has always been interested in surrealism and abstract art, finding metaphors in photos. Double exposure on her DSLR was a revelation, reminding her of childhood experiments with Photoshop overlays. The current trend of AI-generated images intrigued her, leading to an experiment: creating a double exposure series manually with Photoshop and letting AI create its version.

ARVID STAAF

Stockholm, Sweden

Arvid Staaf tries to work as freely as possible, embracing an open-ended work process. His approach mirrors traditional psychoanalysis through free association, aiming to learn about himself, his thoughts, and his feelings. He explores inwardly to understand himself and outwardly to grasp what it means to be a conscious being in this seemingly endless universe.

AGATA ORLOVSKA

Vilnius, Lithuania

Agata Orlovska is a Lithuanian painter known for her work with objects and sound installations. She explores the connections between the physical body of painting and the image itself, avoiding confinement to the canvas's materiality. By separating technique from narrative, she abstracts the themes in her work, creating subtle, almost indistinct references. Her use of color, stroke, and texture act as cultural signifiers, while her technological knowledge helps her uncover narratives inherent in the medium.

NEDA NAUJOKAITĖ

Vilnius, Lithuania

Neda Naujokaitė explores the interplay of static and dynamic images in her work, focusing on transitional spaces and the introspective aspects of memory and experience. Naujokaitė's work delves into the concept of non-places and the transient nature of modern life. She combines elements of light, reflection, and specific details to evoke a sense of intertwined memory and experience.

ROKAS JANUŠONIS

Vilnius, Lithuania

Rokas Janušonis is a Lithuanian artist specializing in ceramics, known for his conceptual and stylistic explorations of the medium. He combines ceramics and painting to create unique narratives and shapes, often using ready-made ceramic objects like Soviet-era drainage pipes, pots and other found materials.

MARION SAARIK

Parnu, Estonia

Marion Saarik’s practice revolves around themes of time, perception, and self-expression, often manipulating imagery to challenge viewers' perceptions.
Saarik's work captures moments of melancholy and existential longing, reflecting on personal and socio-political influences. Her paintings explore the intersection of individual emotions and broader societal themes.

GABRIELĖ MONGINAITĖ

Kėdainiai, Lithuania

It was never otherwise. Two forces collide in the work: the human and nature. They act as adversary energies, yet simultaneously endow each other with the power needed to spread, unveiling the law of coexistence. The moving images reveal the layer of the incessant, mechanical human-driven terraforming of the planet and the adaptation of such (re)formed terrain to human needs. The recurring mountain motif on the screen is terricones of Phosphogypsum waste piled up in the Kėdainiai district (Lithuania), author's hometown

EILA KALVE

Latvia

Eila Kalve’s work focuses on the modern relationship with digital environments, depicting themes of isolation and virtual socialization.
This series of paintings reflects on the pervasive role of screens in daily life, exploring the intersection of human connections and technology. Kalve examines the isolating effects of the digital world and questions its impact on modern socialization.

KATRĪNA BIKSONE

Riga, Latvia

Katrīna Biksone has participated in various group and solo exhibitions in Latvia and Germany. She participated in exchange programs at the Academy of Fine Arts of Rome and the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig.

This series explores modern man's fear of intimacy, using sports metaphors to illustrate self-defense mechanisms. The Latvian term “paukošana” (fencing) symbolically represents the noise and triviality in the individual's struggle with isolation and the weight of existence.

EEVA LIETONEN

Helsinki, Finland

I primarily work with oil painting, self-made oil paints, fresco technique, and metal shaping. My works can simultaneously be delicate and fierce, frightening and sympathetic, understanding and distancing. The interplay of contrasting emotional states, memories, layers of thought, and the space between layers are some of the foundations of my practice. An attitude aimed at understanding involves openness to things rather than an attempt to control them.

Baltic Artists

“The works of different generations of Baltic artists exhibited at the Triennial reflect current trends in the content and form of painting. These pieces reveal the artists' thought processes, their explorations in pictorial expression, and the issues that resonate with them, provoking and inspiring their work today. The Triennial's title, "I am here not to be tolerated, I am here to provoke you," captures the artist's presence in the Time, an attempt to create a relationship with the viewer and, in a way, a relationship with oneself.”

„Trienalėje eksponuojami Baltijos šalių skirtingų kartų menininkų darbai atliepia šiandienos tapybos turinio ir formos tendencijas, parodo jų mąstymą, tapybinės raiškos atradimus ir tai, kas jiems aktualu, kas juos dirgina, jaudina šiandien... Trienalės pavadinimas „Aš čia ne tam, kad mane toleruotumėte, aš čia tam, kad jus dirginčiau“ nusako menininko buvimą laikmetyje bei mėginimą sukurti santykį su žiūrovu, tam tikra prasme, ir santykį su savimi.“

Curator / kuratorė: assoc. prof. Meda Norbutaitė (LT)

KAIDO OLE

Tallinn, Estonia

From today's experience, I would say that for me, making art is an intermediate station between everyday life and the ideal life. Art itself is certainly not an end in itself or a thing in itself, but a technique for celebrating both what is experienced and what is desired, thereby creating a launching pad to soar higher or reach further.

MĀRIS ČAČKA

Daugavpils, Latvia

Latvian artist Maris Čačka has created a unique hybridical method of abstract expression that integrates painting and graphic art. Works are multilayered in terms of technical explanation and content. They occur as imaginary dialogues between the author and his contemporaries about the sense of the world. An intuitive expression has been aimed at achieving emotional harmony.

VITA OPOLSKYTĖ

Vilnius, Lithuania

I am a visual artist whose field of interest is exploring the relation between reality and fiction, mixing intimate personal and general cultural experiences, emphasizing the psychological and emotional suggestion of the represented situations. Using painting as my main medium, I aim to create paintings that question the universality of each experience, convey the multi-layered nature of modern life, and invite the audience to unravel the stories unfolding in them.

ANDRIS VĪTOLIŅŠ

Riga, Latvia

"Future of the fragmented perception"

In the twenty-first century, digital tools and systems are beginning to replace human mind dominance. On the one hand, we respect and trust these institutions, but on the other, they may be a dangerous place for human survival.

…………Who is behind that power, that is the question?

How much longer will we tolerate society's falling level of intelligence?

MANTAS VALENTUKONIS

Kaunas, Lithuania

Mantas Valentukonis is a young generation painter, in whose canvases the spaces of reality and digitality overlap. The matrixes of realism and virtuality in Mantas’ works are in a certain sense in conflict – the planes of the picture that often collide are separated by different painting techniques, thus highlighting the visual and conceptual differences between the two.

SIGITA DAUGULE

Riga, Latvia

My working method involves the layered process of applying paint, modeling medium, coats of varnish, and pigment on the surface of the canvas. According to curator and art historian Inga Šteimane (Riga, Latvia) – “at the cradle of Daugule’s style (emerged in the late 90s) there are significant memories of the expansion of modern art with its uprising against classical culture and against man as a whole mayor. The criteria of modernism are abstract concepts, abstract emotions, and the order set by chaos.

ELENA BALSIUKAITĖ

Kaunas, Lithuania

Déjà vecu is French for “already experienced”. This experience is accompanied by a strong feeling of knowing what will happen next. Presque vu means “almost seen”. It is a phenomenon – the feeling of something right there, but you cannot get it, that nagging state when you cannot remember a well-known word. These are the states that accompany me, when I construct the visual body of the painting.

MIRJAM HINN

Tartu, Estonia

Mirjam Hinn is an Estonian artist with an abstract and dynamic painting language. Her work is characterized by lush brushstrokes, clean paint surfaces, intense colors, and an interplay of tenderness and powerful dynamics. Some of key themes in her practice have evolved from her fascination with the phenomenon of synaesthesia, the idea of blended senses. Also light, nature and artificial structures that are intertwined, and different levels of consciousness.

MARKO MÄETAMM

Tallinn, Estonia

For me art means communication. I am interested in provoking dialogues and making people think outside their comfort zones and taboos. My work is about things I am concerned about in this world. It is a mirror of the present time – the only time that really exists and makes sense.