Artūrs Punte. Guest workers, 2007
Venue: Pickle Bar, Stephanstraße 11, 10559 Berlin
Language: English
Doors open at 18:00. Program starts at 18:30
The Latvian Centre for Contemporary Art (LCCA), in collaboration with the Kai Art Centre and the Mo Museum, invites you to the event "Portable Landscapes. Reflections on Migration from the Baltic Region" on October 25 at the Pickle Bar, Berlin. The event will bring together artists from the Baltic countries to address contemporary issues of migration, identity and language through conversations, performative gestures, and screenings.
The event's program is based on the LCCA project "Portable Landscapes", which has explored the Latvian exile and diaspora in Paris, Gotland, Berlin, Montreal and New York through research and exhibitions. The project’s culmination is an upcoming publication – a book “Portable Landscapes. Latvian Exile Art histories” published by Berlin based publisher K. Verlag.
By inviting artists and institutions from Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia, the iteration of the event at the Pickle Bar extends the research and representation to a Baltic dimension.
The event on October 25 will bring together artists Viktor Timofeev, Maria Kapajeva, Agnė Juodvalkytė and Artūrs Punte (text group Orbita). Their work uses a variety of media, including drawing, installation, photography and video and reflects on social processes in the context of belonging. It includes cultural references, emotional connotations and dislocations.
At the Pickle Bar, they will discuss migration and its connection to the history of the region and its impact on contemporary processes. Participating artists will also raise questions of language, both as part of the experience of moving between countries and as an imprint of Russian colonialism on the Baltic social and political landscape.
The hosts of the event – Pickle Bar – is a non-profit project space, that focuses on research, performances and discussions, launched in 2020 by artist collective Slavs and Tatars with Anastasia Marukhina and Patricia Couvet to extend the collective’s Eurasian platform (Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia) to a greater public.
The project is curated by Andra Silapētere and Inga Lāce and realized by the LCCA in cooperation with Kai Art Center in Tallin and Mo Museum in Vilnius. “Portable Landscapes. Reflections on migration form the Baltic region” is sponsored by Baltic Culture Fund.
About the Artists:
Agnė Juodvalkytė is a visual artist living in Berlin and Vilnius. Her practice is focused on abstract painting and textiles mostly. She received BA in Painting at the Vilnius Academy of Arts (2010) and studied Visual Arts in Spain at the Universidad de Castilla La Mancha (UCLM, Cuenca). Her recent shows include solo exhibition “Tools for the Future ” at the Enter Art Space, Aarhus, Denmark (2023); “Tools for the Future ”(ANSKA), Galerie Bernau, Germany (2022).; “Sweet Dreams Foundation ” at Nida Art Colony, Lithuania (2022); “Gathering”, Atletika gallery, Vilnius, Lithuania (2021); “ANSKA”, Blake & Vargas gallery in Berlin (2021); group show Audra, Pamario gallery, Juodkrantė, Lithuania (2021); “Cosmic Thread ” at the Enter Art Space, Aarhus, Denmark (2020); Terpė at AV17 gallery in Vilnius, Lithuania (2020).
Maria Kapajeva is an artist who works between the UK and Estonia. Her work often highlights micro-histories and peripheral stories with a feminist urge to make them visible. In her artistic practice, she uses different mediums that she chooses depending on their conceptual support of her ideas. Kapajeva enjoys working with found and vernacular photographic images, video installations, textile, and embroidery as well as other materials. She has received awards such as the Wiralt Fellowship of the Estonian Ministry of Culture (2023) and Kraszna-Krausz Photo Book Award (2021), the Runner-Up Award at FOKUS Video Art Festival in Denmark (2018) and was shortlisted for Aperture PhotoBook Award (2018). She exhibits internationally and her works are in such collections as Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art and Tartu Art Museum. Currently Kapajeva does a practice-based PhD at the Estonian Academy of Arts and runs her studio “Circle in Cube '' in Tallinn as a space for sharing art, ideas, and support.
Artūrs Punte is a poet and artist working in interdisciplinary genres. He also has been working as editor, compiler and publisher. He has graduated from the Moscow Literature Institute (poetry), Riga 13th Vocational School (graphic design), studied at the Bulduri School of Horticulture (plant growing). Punte is the author of four books of poetry, co-author of several art exhibitions. One of the founders and members of the “Orbita” association. Curator of long-term projects “Riga Poetry Map”, “Strenči Sonification Station”, etc. In recent years, he has focused on the genre of sound installations and the creation of unconventional sound instruments.
Viktor Timofeev is an artist based in New York. Timofeev’s multidisciplinary practice is informed by personal experiences, speculative imaginings and everything in between. He received his MFA at the Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam and his BFA at Hunter College in New York. He organizes monthly events that include screenings, performances and sensory deprivation listening sessions at No Moon, an event space in Brooklyn he co-founded in 2018. Timofeev also hosts a show on Montez Press Radio. He has released several LPs, cassettes, digital albums and CDs on labels such Futura Resistenza, Alicja and lobitlandscapes. Recent solo exhibitions include “Pedagogical Games 1” at 427 Gallery in Riga (2024), “DOG” at Interstate Projects in New York (2021), “God Objects” at Karlin Studios / Futura in Prague (2020), “God Room” at Alyssa Davis Gallery in New York (2018) and “Stairway to Melon” at Kim? Contemporary Art Center in Riga (2017).
Image credits: Artūrs Punte. Guest workers, 2007