Photo: Mersedese Margoit
On November 27, the Latvian Centre for Contemporary Art (LCCA) will celebrate the launch of the 19th edition in its Translation Series—Rosie Braidotti’s influential work "Nomadic Subjects"—with a performance program titled "Charge". Created in collaboration with the Kaunas Artists’ House (KAH) project "Obscene West. BMW", the event will take place at the LCCA office at Alberta iela 13, Riga, featuring artists from the Baltics and Ukraine: Joelis Aškinis, Normal Babyy, and Olga Stein (Kalynovska-Kravchuk). The event will also introduce a broader series of events — "Safe Zones, Shifting Timelines" — which will unfold at the LCCA Information Centre in 2026.
About the Book
Since its first publication in 2005, the LCCA’s Translation Series of Significant Works in Aesthetics, Visual Arts, and Cultural Theory has aimed to make globally significant texts accessible in Latvian.
"Nomadic Subjects", by the renowned Italian-Australian feminist and posthumanist philosopher Rosie Braidotti (b. 1954), was first published in 1994 and has profoundly influenced contemporary continental philosophy and feminist theory. From a feminist perspective, the book challenges traditional constructs of identity and offers insights into the interconnected and ever-changing nature of modern existence. By reinterpreting the feminine through the nomadic, the book emphasizes the importance of embracing difference and diversity, which can foster greater freedom and openness in the world.
The Latvian translation was done by Dens Dimiņš, with an afterword by Anne Sauka, edited by Aivars Vaivods, proofread by Ildze Jurkāne, and designed by Aleksejs Muraško. The Translation Series publications are available for purchase at the LCCA office in Riga, Alberta iela 13, and online at www.lcca.lv here.
Launch Program
The launch program "Charge" connects Braidotti’s philosophical concept of nomadic subjectivity with the perspectives of Baltic and Ukrainian artists, rethinking the post-Soviet space through the prism of belonging, attachment, and movement. It explores the boundaries between East and West, theory and performance, power and vulnerability.
Ukrainian artist, curator, and scenographer Olga Stein (Kalynovska-Kravchuk) will invite attendees to a performative dinner, "Many Are Called, Few Are Chosen. Matthew 22:14", where she will serve food in vessels crafted from taxidermied animal parts—claws, hooves, and tails—symbolicly bridging the tense geopolitical crisis with the choices we accept or reject.
The interdisciplinary artist duo Normal Babyy (Elza Auguste Zīverte and Kristofers Knesis) will present "Charge" — a performance combining sound and action that challenges the audience’s perception and behavior, testing the limits between dominance and overcoming fear, and prompting reflection on time, space, and the surrounding environment.
Lithuanian artist Joelis Aškinis’s performance "Exhibiting good will and lack of antagonism", will be speech-based where any attempt to take a concrete position quickly becomes absurd and unacceptable. Aškinis’s practice often examines the shifting meanings of symbols and signs, creating a paradoxical and contradictory network of viewpoints.
The program was developed within the framework of the collaborative project "Obscene West. BMW" by curators Andra Silapētere (LCCA) and Agnė Bagdžiūnaitė (KAH) as a response to contemporary social and political tensions in Latvia and Lithuania, as well as broader geopolitical processes worldwide.
"Obscene West" is a multidisciplinary project by KAH that explores changes in cultural context related to sexuality in the 1990s—a period of social, political, and cultural upheaval in Lithuania following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
“Currently, both Latvia and Lithuania are experiencing political situations that threaten democratic, inclusive, and open societal values. Our goal with this program is to create a space where we can reflect on the region’s ongoing struggles with history, social norms, and geopolitical pressures, and illuminate the instability—and absurdity—of ideological positions,” comments Andra Silapētere on the program’s context.
Safe Zones, Shifting Timelines
The LCCA project "Safe Zones and Shifting Timelines" is an interdisciplinary series of events that will explore the fragile relationship between institutional archives and knowledge, collective memory, and changing political situations in the Baltic region. Combining conversation workshops and artistic interventions, the series invites participants to reconsider how archives and their various forms serve as "safe zones" for historical knowledge, while also being subject to uncertainty, reinterpretation, and institutional challenges in political, social, and economic contexts. The series will begin with the launch of Rosie Braidotti’s Nomadic Subjects and continue with a program of artistic interventions and discussions in the LCCA archive in 2026.
The event is organized by the Latvian Centre for Contemporary Art in collaboration with Kaunas Artists’ House. Project Obscene West. BMW is organised by Kaunas Artists’ House and funded by the Lithuanian Council for Culture. Olga Stein’s participation is made possible through collaboration with TUR Space and the support of the State Culture Capital Foundation. The publication of Rosie Braidotti’s book is supported by the State Culture Capital Foundation.
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"Obscene West" is a multidisciplinary project by Kaunas Artists’ House that explores changes in cultural context related to sexuality in the 1990s—a period of social, political, and cultural upheaval in Lithuania following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Over several years, "Obscene West" has unfolded in three chapters. The first, In Honey (2021), focused on women artists and feminist practices of the 1990s. The second, Naglis (2023), explored the emergence of queer culture in the region. The recent chapter, BMW, has been investigating masculinity and its performative, symbolic, and hierarchical structures, drawing on Artūras Tereškinas’ Men, Forms of Masculinity, and the Politics of Masculinism in Contemporary Lithuania (2004). The acronym “BMW” refers both to the 2005 Baltic Triennial Black Market Worlds, curated by Raimundas Malašauskas at the CAC Vilnius, and to the BMW car brand as an enduring emblem of aspirational masculinity in post-Soviet contexts.