XII Young Painter Prize Book

PATRONS: 

Dali van Rooij Rakutyte, 

Mindaugas Raila, 

Nicolas Ortiz family, 

The Bajorunas/Sarnoff Foundation 

SPONSORS: 

www.ypp.lt 

© 2020 

Editor: Julija Dailidėnaitė / www.palmeirao.art 

Translation: Igne Stewart and Malcolm Stewart 

Design: Toma Brundzaitė / www.brunto.lt 

YPP organizer: VšĮ Šiuolaikiniai meno projektai

08 

XII YPP Jury 

CONTENT 

18 

Where does painting stand today? 

16 

The winner 

takes it all

38 

Contemporary painting as a creator 

of insights about the world 

66 

XII YPP Winner 

54 

Finalist 

88 

Participants

6 

J U R Y : 

Jean-Max Colard - 

an art critic, exhibition curator and literary scholar. He’s 

actually working at The Centre Pompidou as head of the Talk 

Program and as responsible for the new online Centre Pompidou’s 

school. Since 2004 he curated numerous exhibitions, including 

“Duras Song” (Centre Pompidou, 2015), or « Seoul, vite, vite », a large 

show about the new korean art scene (Lille, 2015). 

Jean-Max Colard was the chief editor of the arts page of the French 

magazine “Les Inrockuptibles” (from 1997 to 2017). Also he was the 

co-artistic director of Christian Bernard for Le Printemps de 

septembre à Toulouse in 2008 and 2009. In 2005 with “Offshore” 

Jean-Max Colard curated the Fondation Ricard Prize in 2005. 

Jean-Max Colard organized the pluridisciplinary event « Extra ! » at 

the Centre Pompidou, devoted to literature beyond the book, and 

created the first literary Prize of the Centre Pompidou. This Festival is 

at the crossroads of literature and contemporary art and is 

interested in all the forms that literary creation takes today: readings, 

performances, exposed literature, visual or digital, sound poetry, 

public meetings.

10

J U R Y : 

Jānis Avotiņš - 

a Latvian painter, a tutor and lecturer, the receipient of the Prix 

Jean-François Prat in 2016. He has been featured in private and 

public collections around the world including Rubell Family 

Collection; Cranford Collection; Hort Family Collection; François 

Pinault Collection; Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo and 

The Federal Republic of Germany Contemporary Art Collection. 

The Artist has gained inspiration and motifs for his work in the 

visual legacy of the recent past, including photographs found in state 

and private archives, retouched Soviet-era press illustrations and city 

guidebooks. Avotiņš delves into this cultural and historical legacy not 

only for building blocks for his creative output but acts as a 

careful archeologist, attempting to free his paintings and drawings 

from unnecessary semantic layers, often erasing indications that 

would place his figures in a specific time frame. The artist moves 

images of the past to a different universe, a dimension of time 

characteristic only of a work of art, the ’now’ of art.

10 

J U R Y : 

Lina Lapelytė - 

an artist living and working in London and Vilnius. In 2019 Lina earned 

Lithuanian National Culture and Art Prize and Venice Art Biennale 

“Golden Lion” for the opera-performance “Sun and Sea (Marina)” 

(Together with Rugile Barzdžiukaitė and Vaiva Grainyte). 

Lapelytė’s performance Candy shop – the Circus was shown at the 

FIAC (Paris, 2017) and Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art, 

Barcelona. Other shows and performances include: 1857, Oslo (2017), 

Kunstraum, London (2017); Venice architecture Biennial, Venice 

(2016); CAC, Vilnius (2016), Focal Point Gallery, UK (2016), Nylo, 

Reykjavik (2016), Hayward Gallery Touring, UK (2015); Block 

Universe, London (2015); Serpentine Galleries, London (2014); 

Baltic Center for Contemporary Art, Newcastle (2014); David Roberts 

Art Foundation, London (2014/2017); Queen Elizabeth Hall, London 

(2014). In 2018 her works will be presented at the Baltic Triennial, 

curated by Vincent Honnoré.

J U R Y : 

Liina Raus - 

organic and bioorganic chemist, former textile conservator of 

Estonian National Museum textile collection, art enthusiast, explorer, 

curator, art collector, gallerist, the co-founder and manager of Kogo 

gallery - a contemporary art gallery representing outstanding 

emerging and mid-career Estonian and international artists of 

all media. Since its establishment in spring 2018, it has been Kogo’s 

aim to help the artists with their international visibility, to introduce 

their artistic practices as widely as possible and to create and 

maintain professional contacts with art aficionados and 

community of collectors. 

As a chemist previously worked in connection with the 

pharmaceutical industry, Liina Raus is convinced that art is a great 

mind stimulator, a drug with little side effects.

14 

J U R Y : 

Vilmantas Marcinkevičius - 

a Lithuanian painter, initiator of international competition for young 

artists - Young Painter Prize, art collector. His artistic style was shaped 

while studying at Vilnius Academy of Arts during the collapse of the 

Soviet Union. After finishing his studies, the artist and his works were 

soon noticed by art collectors from Denmark. Thanks to NB Galleri 

galerist Thorkild Nielsen who is exhibiting his paintings in Scandinavia 

more than 20 years, nowadays, his artworks are amongst 

the tops of the Northern Europe art market. In 2019 he earned 

Lithuanian Art Creator Association award for the Young Painter Prize 

(together with colleague Julija Dailidėnaitė), in 2009 he won online 

Showdown competition run by the Saatchi Gallery, were was 

displayed his painting “Madonna of the 21st Century”. His numerous 

exhibitions in Europe, Asia and US, prizes and commissions bear 

witness of an artist who is living a really active artistic life. 

Artworks of Vilmantas astonish: spontaneous power of gesture, huge 

sizes of canvases, impudent colors, ironical and insolent themes, vivid 

colors expressionally flow, splash, spurt, wander and cover the 

canvas. He has been featured in private and public collections around 

the world including The Danish Royal Family Collection, Lithuanian 

National Gallery, Mo museum, Lewben Art Foundation.

16 

The Winner Takes It All 

Song by Abba (1980) 

*

The 12th winner of the Young Painter Prize 

will be announced on the 13th of November 

at the “Pakrante” gallery in Vilnius. In 

the run-up to one of the most important 

painting events of the year in the Baltics, 

we asked Latvian art critic and curator 

Šelda Puķīte to share her thoughts on the 

contemporary art scene and the situation 

for the young artists in it. Painting has 

been buried then revived many times over 

the last few decades, but now we can see 

that the medium is once more in ascent. 

Where Does Painting Stand Today? 

Text by curator and critic Šelda Puķīte

18 

Where Does Painting 

Stand Today? 

“Today, painting has overcome its historical 

“burden” to be the “archetype” of art, 

and has become “only” a medium, which 

is neither better nor worse than others.” 1 

This seemingly liberating conclusion was 

penned in an essay by the Latvian art 

historian Ieva Astahovska that was published 

in the catalog of the very first major 

art show of 21st century dedicated to the 

newest shape-shifters of the medium of 

painting in Latvia. The exhibition, “Candy 

Bomber: Young Latvian Painters”, which 

took place in Latvian National Museum 

of Art exhibition hall Arsenāls in 2007, 

signalled that following the popularity of 

installations and photography in 90’s and 

early 00’s, the medium of painting had 

regained the attention of the younger 

generation of artists. The show went on to 

have two more iterations. The first in 2010 

(Urbanchildren: Young Latvian Painters) 

still pretty much echoed the first exhibition, 

while a second in 2016 (“Tension. Young 

Painters in Latvia”) already began to show 

signs that young artists were thinking 

about what painting is and how it can be 

used. But what did this liberation of painting 

really mean, and where does it 

really stand today in the pluralism of the 

art world? 

I’m not sure how fruitful it is to touch upon 

the topic of the several “deaths” and 

“rebirths” of painting that has been circulating 

in the minds and writings of art 

professionals and thinkers for almost two 

centuries now. Following the last “renaissance” 

of painting at the beginning of 

21st century this “death bell ring tone”

seemed to have quieted down. Still, it 

tends to sneak in between the lines of critical 

texts every time an important contemporary 

art show presents a decent 

amount of paintings. It is as if it were some 

sort of miracle similar to the biblical awakening 

of Lazarus. The reason for this may 

not be attributable simply to the expectation 

of painting’s timely demise, but more 

to the fact that contemporary art shows 

more often privilege photography, video 

and installation. These different alternative 

forms of media have replaced painting’s 

function to represent the visible world and 

to connect more with modern society. 

whom such an outcome is an issue. Then 

there is the contemporary art scene which 

snubs painters as professionals belonging 

to the old world, meaning that artists have 

to catch the zeitgeist by the tail to remain 

relative. The ironic moment in all of this is 

that if the contemporary art world 

accepts the painter, the market quickly 

follows anyway as paintings sell well. So, 

the painter as the winner takes all. 

The French painter Paul Delaroche was 

the first to proclaim painting’s death in the 

first half of 19th century, spurred on by the 

invention of photography. But instead of 

thinking from the loser’s perspective, we 

can look upon these changes as a liberation 

of painting – allowing it to develop its 

own unique language and other qualities, 

free from specific function or obligation 

to the world. Even more, painting gets to 

retain what the philosopher Walter Benjamin 

called an “aura”. It can keep its status 

as an analog art form status instead of 

becoming a technically reproduced object, 

as well as its grand history and unshakable 

pole position in the art market. So, 

then what’s the problem? Well, it can unfortunately 

easily fall into the trap of commercialism 

and never get past the status 

of a luxury product or a design object. 

This, of course, applies to those artists for 

1 Astahovska, Ieva. Painting in the Age of Representation // 

Candy Bomber. Young Latvian Painters. Compilers: Diāna 

Barčevska, Maija Rudovska. - Rīga: RJA “VERITAS”, 2007. 

- P.8.

20 

Everything Is Liquid, 

Everything Is Painting

One of the minds behind the world-famous 

Eames designs, Ray Eames, was 

herself a classically trained painter. She 

said that she never gave up painting, she 

just changed her pallet. Painting is not a 

strictly defined form; it can manifest itself 

as an artistic vision or worldview. It 

can be present in the way an artist uses 

color, artistic gestures, space, and even 

time. It can be a performative movement 

that incorporates painterly qualities - the 

aggressiveness or softness of the brush. 

There are definitely dozens of artists who 

work with sculpture, installations, performances, 

photo and video art who from my 

point of view are painters using different 

kind of canvas. 

Pop artists like Roy Lichtenstein took one 

of painting’s most important tools –the 

brushstroke - and transformed it into a 

mechanical, cold reproduction, or in other 

words created a gravestone for it. Now, 

apart from art that is strongly influenced 

by the presence of the internet, there are 

also certain forms that are reminiscent of 

modernism. The brush stroke has suddenly 

not just broken free from Lichtenstein’s flat 

image in all its juicy textures and liquidity, 

but it has also jumped out of the canvas 

and become a sculptural entity itself. 

The “fluidity” 2 we are experiencing now is 

not just connected with the fluid borderlines 

that exist between different art forms. 

It’s time itself that has triggered a different 

look at the world that hopefully won’t get 

jammed by political “earthquakes” and 

pandemics. Physical mobility and internet 

connections have changed the way we 

perceive our location, our connection with 

it, and travel. It has been popular for some 

time to revisit history, trying to decolonize 

and expand it by filling it with stories of 

different marginalized groups including 

woman, queer communities and different 

cultures and races. Archiving the ghosts 

of the past has also become an important 

part of the oeuvre of modern painters like 

Luc Tuyman, Marlene Dumas and Neo 

Rauch, all of whom blend their own personal 

micro histories into their works. 

A crucial source of liquidity is the influence 

of the internet, the streams and surfing 

opportunities it has provided, and the flows 

of images and information we have experienced. 

And then finally there is the post 

human movement which forces us to shift 

from our position of center and reconnect 

with other living things and the world as 

such. This idea about reconnecting and 

fluidity is very much present in the poetic 

texts of the essayist Astrida Neimanis, 

which are dedicated to the topic of hydrofeminism 

3 . Here she speaks of bodies being 

water which, connected in an imaginably 

tight yet fluid way, allow us to be 

free of dogmas and flow where we need 

to. 

2 I borrowed the term from sociologist and philosopher 

Zygmunt Bauman. He introduced late modernity as “liquid” 

modernity which is marked by the global capitalist economies 

and by the information revolution. 

3 Neimanis, Astrida. Bodies of Water. Posthuman Feminist 

Phenomenology. - Lodon: Bloomsbury Academic, 2017.

22 

There is also social politics, of course. 

The younger generation is at this moment 

ready to be socially active and so is art. 

There are people that might disagree, 

but even if the artist creates abstracts or 

landscapes there is a certain layer that 

will always deliver some sort of political 

message. Apolitical art is an illusion. 

Paintings possess the potential to speak 

in very different layers. They can touch us 

almost unconsciously, and that’s where we 

come back again to the concept of fluidity. 

Unfortunately, the art world itself is both 

inclusive and exclusive. But there is hope. 

Taking into consideration the activism that 

is happening, the rewriting of history and 

the creation of a more inclusive society - 

it seems inevitable that this will affect art 

and the art market also. And indeed, we 

are already seeing greater numbers of females 

and a high proportion of multi-ethnic 

artists present.

The 2019 Venice Biennale showed us that 

there has been a shift in the representation 

of different genders, with the amount 

of women artists participating the largest 

in its long history (many of whom were 

painters). Liquidity has happened not just 

in art but also in other aspects of life, giving 

a main stage to those who have had 

a harder time to be noticed before. This 

has also effected an important shift in the 

way the world is represented through art. 

The gaze has changed, with the female 

gaining more dominance than ever before. 

From the Female 

Gaze To a Naked 

Man With White Socks 

Identity in one or another way has always 

been on the menu of art but now it seems 

to have become an even more important 

dish. The historical discoveries that have 

been actualized and represented have 

become an important encouragement to 

many. For example, the discovery of the 

first abstract painter Hilma af Klint, and 

now the big show of baroque painter Artemisia 

Gentileschi 4 all play an important 

role. The women’s history movement that 

started in 70’s has now become a true 

powerhouse, thanks to the undertakings of 

influential institutions. Hopefully this movement 

won’t be hushed by the conservative 

section of society - to which a large 

number of historians unfortunately belong. 

It seems that the stigma amongst women 

that painting represents the patriarchy is 

also not so present anymore. 

4 Exhibition “Artemisia” (3.10.2020-24.01.2021). The National 

Gallery, London.

24 

From the Baltic States I would like to 

highlight a few interesting artists that I 

would associate with painting. From Latvia 

we could list such internationally and 

commercially successful artists as Ēriks 

Apaļais, Jānis Avotiņš and Inga Meldere, 

but for me they represent the first generation 

of 21st century. Also, although they 

make use of interesting approaches like 

working with archives, memories and language 

transported into canvas, they still 

don’t seem to be “liquid” enough. Artists 

from the subsequent generation like Elīna 

Vītola and Amanda Ziemele are already 

showing a different approach. They both 

seemed to be starting from from more 

modernistic and abstract roots, injecting 

these stylistic points of departure with 

different topics that are socially relevant 

today. 

In Vītola’s case it has turned her works, 

which comment heavily on an art community, 

into an artistic factory which involves 

several other artists. The joint installation 

titled “Artist Crises Center” (2019) is a 

good example of her practice. I would also 

like to draw attention to the last artist 

who represented Latvia at the Venice 

Biennale - Daiga Grantiņa with her fleshy, 

liquid and baroque like sculptural installations 

which in my view are very painterly. 

From Estonia two names immediately 

come to my mind – Merike Estna and 

Kristi Kogi. Both create semi abstract work 

using bright colors, often allowing their 

paintings to transform by placing them in 

murals or spatial installations. In Estna’s 

case, we can also talk about the elements 

of mysticism, symbolism and even shamanism 

that are present in her work, and 

that leads me to another Estonian artist 

Kris Lemsalu. Her rainbow colored, symbolic 

and expressive sculptures, installations 

and performances are like paintings 

that have exploded, and from which the 

characters have crawled out to then begin 

their own ritual dance or circus performance. 

My knowledge of the Lithuanian scene is 

unfortunately much poorer than I would 

like to admit. I of course know the strong 

tradition of expressionism that I guess is 

still present in many artists’ works though 

maybe in a more subtle, dream like way. 

The previously mentioned Elīna Vītola very 

much likes to comment on the contemporary 

art world she her-self is part of, 

and the same is true of the Estonian artist 

Alexei Gordin, although there is a stronger 

narrative element in his work. I guess in 

the Lithuania case a solid example could 

be Egle Karpaviciute. A younger generation 

artist whose painting I really liked from 

previous the Young Painter Prize short list 

exhibition was Raminta Blazeviciute. Her 

works follow the above mentioned tradition, 

although this is mixed together with 

surrealism and a low brow street vibe 

which makes them very current. Looking 

from more looser perspectives I would like 

to include in this list the artistic duo Pakui 

Hardware. Their work, which synthesizes 

materials and forms that seem to physically 

manifest the hydro-feminism ideas, 

are a pure example of what is painterly 

today, not to mention the concept of the 

liquid modernity. 

A similar exciting change has been performed 

by artists who are shifting away 

from the tradition of the western art history

canon, or who have been mixing it with 

their own unique heritage which is not 

part of western culture. There are predictions 

both from scholars and curators 

alike that the exciting works made now 

that are being exhibited in many major art 

festivals and museums might become the 

new benchmark and inspiration for European 

artists in the future. But where in all 

this does the white male artist stand? We 

can say that in the same social fluidity as 

the rest of the world. At the same time this 

confusion of identity in 21st century masculinity, 

mixed with the magical thinking 

that has blossomed in last decade, is very 

nicely presented by the work of the British 

artist Glen Pudvine. His confrontational 

work has been described as the potential 

death of art. Pudvine’s surreal paintings 

are self-portraits as nudes in which he 

is only wearing white socks. His figure is 

positioned in strange, fantastic yet disturbing 

landscapes in which he has a monster 

as a partner. They remind one of the 

aesthetics and fantasies of the old Dutch 

master Hieronymus Bosch mixed with the 

new selfie culture. As the artists explained 

to Elephant magazine, “The self-portrait 

originally felt like a way of exposing my 

total ‘normal-ness’. I didn’t have anything 

to bring to the table.” 5 

5 Link: https://elephant.art/ones-to-watch-the-rising-artstars-of-2020/

Kristi Kongi 

“Mapping the Jungle” at Karen Huber Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico. 2018

Pakui Hardware. “Underbelly” at MdbK Leipzig, Leipzig, 2019-2020 

Eglė Karpavičiūtė. The Portrait of Damien HIRST. 60x80, oil on canvas. 2012

Raminta Blaževičiūtė artwork in the XI Young Painter Prize exhibition, 2019

Glen Pudvine.”Born” 186x156cm, oil on canvas. 2019

Alexei Gordin. 

“Periphery” 80x70cm, acrylic on canvas. 2018 

Courtesy of the artist and Kogo gallery.

34 

If we distance ourselves from our present 

lock down situation arising from the 

worldwide pandemic, we can say that this 

is a marvelous time for young artists. The 

mobility options using different support 

programs for young artists, as well as residencies 

and schools, are almost unlimited. 

But there is a catch. An artist needs to be 

elastic, mobile, and always looking fresh 

and current. There is also constant instability. 

Nothing is stable, nothing is reassuring. 

Looking from this perspective, we can 

say that flexibility and youthfulness and 

also a drop of pure luck is an important 

part of the survivalist strategy. 

Survival Strategies 

For Young Artists 

In the Baltic States, scholarships are 

formed of both public, as well as private 

sector funds. The largest support programs 

are for students or recent school graduates. 

We can all together say that artists 

under 35 years have the most opportunities. 

The only necessary criteria, besides 

ideas and creativity, is to be active. In 

most cases, taking the initiative and not 

waiting for curators to discover them or 

the schools to push them is central, although 

schools and curators still provide 

very crucial support for young and establishes 

artists. Institutional power is still very 

important, but there are also virtual 

platforms, which are another tool that 

should not be overlooked. Then there are 

prizes as well, which should not be taken 

too seriously as an obligatory standard for 

success. But such prizes do provide artists 

with an important opportunity to win 

much needed funding to work. They also 

give them the opportunity to show works 

to expert jury members who might want to 

collaborate in future, and then there is the 

media coverage and the chance to make

exhibitions in different galleries and participate 

in important residencies. 

An interesting separate topic is residencies. 

Some artists use them so extensively 

that they acquire the nickname of “residency 

junkies”. However, it would appear 

that nowadays, aside from the opportunity 

to study art at schools around the world, 

or register for popular online courses, residencies 

are an important exchange tool. 

They provide artist with the possibility to 

experience different geographical locations, 

landscapes and cultures and also 

network, which is crucial these days if an 

artist is looking for future collaborations. 

But at some point, it can begin to feel 

that the art is not as important as all of 

its institutional accoutrements and this is 

something young artists should be always 

careful of. Doing everything by the book 

can get you trapped in the art system 

and market, and you might lose your own 

“voice”. 

“Success means that people are buying 

your works and are hanging them above 

their sofas on the wall”. This is how success 

was explained by Elīna Vītola, the 

winner of The Nordic & Baltic Young Artist 

Award’18, whose installation consisted of 

a 20 m long painted scroll and sofa. This 

statement first of all suggests that success 

is connected with integration into the art 

market. Secondly, for integration to happen, 

art needs to possess decorative functionality 

or trophy like qualities. The artist 

did not invent this statement, but consciously 

borrowed it from the conservative 

teachers of Art Academy of Latvia, who 

introduced this idea to their students. Artists 

are constantly put in situations where 

they need to strike a balance between 

their personal desires, survival and goals to 

reach authenticity. 

In his public lecture series about artistic 

success, the British artist Grayson Perry 

regaled the audience in his usual tongue 

in cheek manner with answers the general 

public gave to a questionnaire about art. 

The results showed that apparently most 

people prefer blue colored paintings and 

landscapes with cows. It may seem kind 

of ridiculous to follow this formula, but 

artist themselves often blindly follow the 

Western artistic canon. In the end this is 

equivalent to the blue landscape with cow 

situation. There are things (some of which 

I mentioned in this essay) that can bring 

you closer to some success, and there are 

different support systems that have been 

invented as well. But before doing something 

important, the artist must first envision 

what exactly the goal of an artist is. 

When this envisioning is complete, artist 

needs to keep an open, curious and flexible 

mind because the world is in a constant 

state of flux.

Elīna Vītola. “Artist Crises Center” at gallery Low, Riga, Latvia, 2019. Photo by Līga Spunde

Contemporary Painting 

as a Creator of Insights 

about the World

Text by art critic Viltė Visockaitė 

The question still remains: how to understand 

and explain contemporary art? Of 

course, you can feel it, although for an art 

critic that’s probably not enough. That is 

why this question is relevant not only for 

spectators and artists but also for professionals 

in my field – intermediaries between 

the work and the audience. In this 

text, I will attempt to unravel the knot of 

contemporary art by touching on the very 

era in which we live, the relationship of the 

work to the context, and the collaboration 

between artist and curator – and by doing 

so discovering at least part of the answer 

to the question raised.

40 

Viscous Present 

My intense attendance of exhibitions in 

recent years has drawn a map in my mind 

which unfolds lifelike paradoxes and the 

(un)truths of the modern world. Contemporary 

art draws us into its enchanting 

narratives of the present, increasingly 

moving us away from the comprehension 

of the whole. Therefore, modernity, or the 

present, is one of the categories that enable 

us to talk about contemporary art. 

Peter Osborn describes modernity as a 

useful product of the imagination that links 

global, unrelated contemporary stories. 

Boris Groys, meanwhile, argues that modernism 

sought to bypass the present by 

shaping the future. Modernity, conversely, 

is understood as an eternal procrastination 

1 . Doubt, uncertainty and indecision are 

the hallmarks of the modern state – procrastination 

creates more time for reflection 

and deliberation. The present is not a 

transition from the past to the future, because 

the future and the past are consstantly 

being rewritten 2 . 

In this context, St. Augustine’s famous 

conception on time becomes of especial 

importance. He argues that there are 

three times: a present of things past, a 

present of things present, and a present of 

things future. He explains that the present 

of things past represents memory, the 

present of this present is sight, while the 

present of things future is expectation 3 . A 

similar concept of phenomenological time 

was developed by Edmund Husserl who 

distinguished the chronological perception 

of time from temporality – the time of 

consciousness. Temporality manifests itself 

in the way that the present is affected by 

both the future and the past. The phenomenon 

itself consists of the initial im

pression, its projection into the near future, 

and the retention of the initial impression. 

We can observe that in the context of modernity, 

both the past and the future acquire 

meaning in the present. As Kristupas 

Sabolius observes, “in today’s art world a 

common element of uncertainty reveals 

both the impossibility of a homogeneous 

present and the postulation of the asynchrony 

of its different temporalities, while 

at the same time raising the problem of 

the nature of time itself” 4 . 

Let us recall the work of Andrius Zakarauskas 

– the first winner of the “Young 

Painter Prize”. The issues of painting as 

a medium, painting as a gesture (paint, 

its application, bright stroke) and the author-artist’s 

self-representation (at the 

beginning of his career the artist often depicted 

his image on canvas) are important 

in his work. Since 2016 the artist’s paintings 

have displayed a new plastic expression 

that is characterised by an excess 

paint, splashing, pouring and embossing. 

The latter aspects are also reflected in 

the titles of his recent paintings, where the 

word “stroke” is dominant (visible stroke, 

larger stroke, third wave stroke, lip stroke, 

caring stroke, pleasant stroke, etc.). Time 

is one of the tools that allow us to interpret 

the materiality of colour in Zakarauskas’ 

oeuvre. Such paintings as Lipstroke (2017) 

or Skinstroke (2016) function as an outline 

of a painting itself: a visible process, the 

traces of time, and behind-the-scenes 

creation – with the relief of the painting 

becoming equated with the stroke itself. 

The moment of the painter’s touch on the 

canvas is captured: the tactility of the 

work opens the viewer to the viewer, highlighting 

the elements of corporeality and 

ephemerality. The moment of the painter’s 

touch on the canvas is captured: the 

tactility of the work takes the gaze of the 

viewer to the past, highlighting the elements 

of corporeality and ephemerality. 

1 Claire Bishop, Radical Museology, London: Dan Perjovschi 

and Koenig Books, 2013, p. 18. 

2 Boris Groys, „Comrades of Time”, in: E-flux journal, 2009, 

Nr. 1, http://www.e-flux.com/journal/11/. 

3 Saint Augustine, Confessions, Vilnius: Aidai, 2004, p. 281. 

4 https://artnews.lt/isivaizduojant-laika-39561

42 

Andrius Zakarauskas 

Lipstroke. 50x40cm, oil on canvas, 2017

44 

Networked Painting 

Having discussed the widely researched 

phenomenon of modernity, let us move on 

to the work of art and its circulation within 

various contexts. David Joselit in his book, 

After Art (2013) explains how a work of art 

operates in the (non)art world. He refuses 

to create meaning for the work, which is 

customary for an art critic, instead arguing 

that the value of the work is revealed in 

its context and network of interfaces. An 

image can be closed, inaccessible and 

without any interfaces, or conversely, an 

open and accessible image that has the 

power to reach a huge audience. Consequently, 

the more widely one can relate 

the image to different themes or contexts, 

the more valuable and relevant it is. Networked 

interfaces create possible contexts 

for a work of art, while the art itself is in 

constant flux, changing through the ever 

emerging new relationships between the 

work and its perceiver, gallery, fair, biennial, 

etc. All works of art in circulation 

acquire meaningful and valuable content 

simply because they can be rotated and 

linked to different contexts. 

For example, an artist’s participation in a 

YPP competition is already the creation of 

one of the networks. YPP has been held 

since 2009 and gathers together young 

artists from Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. 

This means that information regarding this 

event reaches not only the local audience, 

but also other Baltic states; therefore, it 

has a positive effect on the Lithuanian 

art field, while the jury consists of famous 

representatives of this field from all over 

Europe. YPP becomes an apparatus that 

ensures the preparation of an exhibition 

catalogue, the opportunity for artists to 

participate in residencies, the ability to

eceive cash prizes and the organization 

of a personal exhibition. The work of the 

artist, having entered the YPP network, 

circulates in the field of art and thus accumulates 

symbolic capital. 

In addition to the interfaces between the 

work of art and the institutions, the state 

and the global stage, the viewer’s experience 

and transformation while observing 

an art work is also important. An 

experience is defined as a memorable 

event that engages the viewer personally. 

While transformation is the effective consequence 

of such an experience, which 

alters the person themself, i.e. influences 

thinking. Thus, art is able to create transformative 

experiences. Dorothea von 

Hantelmann also speaks about the shift 

of meaning towards the perceiver. She 

proposes that the work of art becomes the 

operator of the viewer’s relationship with 

themself and others 5 – meaning arises 

within experience. As society has shifted 

from materiality (a society of surplus) to 

an evaluation of experience, it is not surprising 

that this also applies to art. 

So how does painting belong to the network? 

As Joselit suggests, painting can 

visualise these networks. Thus the object 

of art encompasses several media, contexts 

and places. For example, in the Lux 

Interior (2009) exhibition, New York, Jutta 

Koether’s painting functioned as an installation, 

part of a performance, and a 

painted canvas. The painting Hot Rod 

(After Poussin) is a monochrome remake 

of Nicolas Poussin’s canvas Landscape 

with Pyramus and Thisbe (1651), in which 

the painting technique – hurried and inert 

– becomes of prime importance 6 and 

is used to mark the elapsed time between 

the paintings of Poussin and the artist herself. 

Moreover, the work was accompanied 

by three lecture-performances – with the 

painting thus becoming an artist’s interlocutor 

and a participant in the performance. 

The artist actualizes the operation of the 

object in the network: the canvas embodies 

the dimension of time and at the same 

time becomes a part of the performance. 

5 Dorothea von Hantelmann, „The Experiential Turn”, in: On 

Performativity, Living Collections Catalogue, 2014, t.1. 

6 David Joselit, „Painting Beside Itself”, in: October, 2009, 

Nr. 130, pp. 125-134.

Gintarė Konderauskaitė 

2020. 100x120cm, acrylic & oil on canvas, 2020

In this case, painting as a medium, painting 

as a social network, or painting as a 

relationship with the body opens up new 

opportunities for interpretation. Painting 

can become a point of intersection within 

installations, performances and other media. 

For example, in Gintarė Konderauskaitė’s 

work, one can spot “painting” with 

a finger – the painter makes a sketch on 

her phone and transfers the exact same 

image that is “painted” on the phone 

screen to the canvas. Thus, the traditional 

painting technique of oil painting and 

the digital drawing merge on the canvas. 

Meanwhile, the canvases by Elena Antanavičiūtė 

with their translucent layers create 

the volume of the body – the shades 

of soft grey, brown and pink contrast with 

the brightness of a body contour, as if 

saying although “hardly visible” – “I am”. 

The painter acquires corporeality through 

the thinness of the paint and its visible 

materiality, thus revealing the body’s relationship 

with time – skin pigmentation, 

stretch marks or wrinkles are layered over 

with oil paint. Therefore, the painting creates 

shapes and structures that enable the 

visualisation of the network, i.e. interfaces 

with digital images, the media itself or 

your own body.

48 

The Painter and 

Curator Union 

In this section, I would like to discuss the 

union of curators and artists that is taking 

root in the contemporary art market. Although 

art survived without a curator for 

5000 years, the 21st century curator – independent 

of the institution – has become 

a figure of particular importance in the 

modern art world. Harold Szeeman, one of 

the first independent curators, contributed 

to this by starting to organize exhibitions 

that did not reflect the objective canon of 

art history, but rather the individual gaze 

of the curator. Dorothea von Hantelmann 

observes that, like the artist, who from antiquity 

to the 18th century was considered 

a craftsman, only to later become viewed 

as a creative genius, so the curator, seeking 

a place in society, has moved from 

their position of service provider to become 

a creator of content and meaning 7 . 

According to Georgina Adam, the curator 

now has the tremendous power to decide 

which artists are significant and which are 

not. Furthermore, the curator’s conception 

sometimes undermines the artist’s work 

itself, which becomes an adjunct to the 

curator’s vision 8 . 

However, a curator, enveloped in the 

knowledge of art history, can establish 

the artist’s work in a contemporary context, 

reveal the strengths of the works and 

present it all to the public. In this light, it is 

worth mentioning several personal exhibitions 

of Lithuanian artists that were curated 

by art critics. First of all, I would like to 

draw attention to the creators of the middle 

generation – Laisvydė Šalčiūtė and 

Laima Kreivytė. Kreivytė, who had curated 

a few of Šalčiūtė’s exhibitions, in 2019 

invited to the space of the gallery “Left- 

Right”, with the gate to the Melusian

artist herself: “this cycle of works features 

the fictional antihero Meliuzina, whom I 

created myself, and who ironically and at 

the same time metaphorically talks about 

the social relations of our time, social 

status and anti-status to which she herself 

belongs; the theatrical mystifications of 

our consumer society and from it following 

tragicomic idiotism that is conditioned 

by the highest value of our consumer 

society – the pursuit of a “happy life”. 

”Although the works were first exhibited 

in the Palace of the Dukes of Mantua, the 

exhibition in the gallery was“ constructed 

as a localized ritual” with Kreivytė herself 

assuming a position more akin to an architect 

than a curator. In the exhibition, 

the viewer immerses themself in a pictorial 

oasis, starting with “the earthier, more 

mundane narration of splashes in the 

bath to a brighter hall with paintings 

containing recognisable paraphrases of 

the works of famous painters. Here, the 

Baroque is “barracked up”, the angels 

wear weapons, the toys, skulls and 

tattoos point to a secondary reality, or an 

otherworld, against which leans a white 

ladder” 9 . The viewer is intuitively led to 

the upper hall of the exhibition (not by 

chance), as if they were being elevated 

towards more universal themes relating to 

cosmogonic myth. In this way, the exhibition 

creates not only a narrative, but also 

a bodily experience of the concept that is 

formed by the architecture. 

7 Dorothea von Hantelmann, „The Curatorial Paradigm“, in: 

The Exhibitionist, 2011, Nr. 4, p. 6. 

8 Georgina Adam, Big Bucks: The Explosion of the Art 

Market in the 21st Century, London: Lund Humphries, 2014, 

pp. 90-92. 

9 https://literaturairmenas.lt/daile/meliuzina-veidrod- 

ziu-karalysteje?fbclid=IwAR3vpZQe4AOHOYYIrLHkIH- 

CVEP-wq_OcCBgt9AAGPXAbF1Yifv47z3MUQLA

50 

Laisvydė Šalčiūtė 

Būtinas angelas. 162x150cm, mixed technique, 2018

Monika Radžiūnaitė 

The exhibition “Hyperlink” fragment. 2020 

V. Nomadas photo

The exhibition “Hyperlink” (2020) at 

the gallery “Arka” put together by a duo 

from the younger generation – Monika 

Radžiūnaitė and Linas Bliškevičius – can 

be singled out as a counterweight to the 

art of the middle generation. By applying 

modern creative strategies, Radžiūnaitė 

revives the plots, symbols and iconography 

of medieval works of art. However, 

what has not been preserved by the written 

sources, the artist fills with the present 

and makes the images of the past 

relevant by passing them through a filter 

of ignorance or stupidity. In the exhibition, 

the artist’s works lurk in a darkened 

space in which small images have been 

stuck within various corners. The gallery’s 

precisely prepared walls respond to the 

thoroughness of the artist’s painting, while 

the works themselves are accompanied by 

texts selected by the curator – hyperlinks 

that create new connections and meanings. 

Both the artist’s work and curatorial 

solutions actualize the past, extend the 

present, and make online links the starting 

point of the exhibition. Consequently, by 

maintaining the balance of ideas between 

the painter and the curator, the exhibition 

becomes an organic art experience in 

which spaces, works, and narrative planes 

intertwine. 

*** 

Contemporary art reflects on both current 

issues and the pulse of today, which 

we may not always be able to grasp. The 

artist, as if a mediator between us and 

time – visualises what at first glance might 

appear banal or boring – our everyday 

experiences, individual truths and sensations. 

The critical evaluation of an art work 

is possible only through interpretation – by 

analysing individual works and thus discovering 

new contours on the map of the 

modern world.

ADELĖ LIEPA KAUNAITĖ SONATA RIEPŠAITĖ DOMINYKAS 

MARTINA KRYŽEVIČIŪTĖ KAZIMIERAS BRAZDŽIŪNAS 

ALVĪNE BAUTRA KAUR MÄEPALU SAMANTA AUGUTĖ

SIDOROVAS DONATA MINDERYTĖ ELENA ANTANAVIČIŪTĖ 

LAURA AIZPORIETE JUSTĪNE SEILE-URTĀNE 

ELIJA GRYBYTĖ LĪGA KALNIŅA KADI REINTAMM

56 

Adelė Liepa Kaunaitė / LT 

City of silence. 

150x150cm, oil on canvas, 2020 

www.facebook.com/AdeleLiepa 

X I I Y P P F I N A L I S T 

There is so much spoken...speaking while disguising the truth and the silence which 

have turned into discomfort. LET’S RETURN THE SILENCE - cozy, tender and pure. 

To feel the comfort of silence. To be in silence together among people, to be in silence 

alone, not to speak, but to feel another human. To build a City of Silence. Listen to the 

wind, the fallen dew, which is awakened by the sun. 

In these paintings, I show my City of Silence. 

Let us be together and touch each other with words of silence.

58 

Alvīne Bautra / LV 

Fragile tension. 

130X150cm, oil on canvas, 2020 

www.alvinebautra.com 


Painting “Fragile tension” highlights the topic of adaptation process (physical and 

mental), which often is related with loss of comfort zone and, probably, creation of the 

new one. Adaptation is manipulation- intentional or unintentional. Adaptation provides 

(demands) figures’ (characters’) dynamic, relapse, variability. Painting “Fragile tension” 

is about losing control during adaptation process. It includes inner anxiety and external 

peace or other way around. I agree with British writer Ken Follett, who writes in one of 

his forewords of novel: “My aim was to portray individual freedoms’ inconspicuous 

submission to the stronger mechanism.” Whatever this “strongest mechanism” is.

60 

Dominykas Sidorovas / LT 

Attempting to get rid of Demons no. 2. The Morning Flag. 


www.galerijavartai.com/artists/33-dominykas-sidorovas/ 


The painting is part of a long-told story about things. The ambiguous motif of the old 

radio accommodates a sentimental state. It’s also a radio broadcasting the news and a 

waving flag announcing the morning. In the summerhouse, Grandfather used to turn on 

the radio every morning. 

In addition to sentimental and intimate states and stories, everyday objects contain 

many other signs of life. Our surroundings are full of things that are full of stories, 

dreams, losses, joy and sorrow. The main motif of my work is a casual object. The 

significance of things is revealed not only through their ambiguous contour or sign, but 

also through the sense of human existence. A part of me can be found in the object 

and that is why the motif attracts me. 

This metaphorical manifesto of things encourages attention to our everyday simple, 

sometimes even boring, environment. Interesting and unexpected marks can only be 

revealed by observing it. We have divided ourselves into various colourful items which 

can be found in a room, an attic or a garage.

62 

Donata Minderytė / LT 

Am I Normal? Kamile, 21 years old. 


www.artsy.net/artist/donata-minderyte/works-for-sale 


In my work, I focus on what is to be avoided in language translation - moving away 

from the original, fading the initial meaning and changing the message - I implement 

these “mistakes” in painting. The equivalent of a word in another language does not 

always have a direct translation, has more than one meaning or simply has no equivalent 

in another language. Analyzing the image in different media, I notice similar things. 

In my work I often use still images from my daily life videos. Between the moment that is 

captured in the video, the memory of it, and the act of painting there is plenty of room 

for translation error to occur. The end result - finished painting - is always far-off from 

the accurate representation of the moment that it was inspired by. 

My paintings are based on the life stories of myself and the people around me. I am 

looking for a way to maintain a connection to a specific time period, preserve its authenticity 

and keep it real but at the same time I am fully aware how sentimental that 

might seem. I have painted many pictures with the same name: “Am I normal? Kamile, 

21 years old”. The starting point for these paintings is a 16-second video that I’ve 

watched way too many times in the last eight years, but to describe what’s happening 

in those sixteen seconds, I had to watch it again. I remember the moment on which this 

painting is based as a set of shapes, colors, light and shadow, but not as a sequence 

of images or continous moving image. That is because usually when I am looking for 

painting material I watch videos with no sound, I press pause and go through images 

ignoring the main video features: duration and timeline. I scroll through stills coldheartedly 

objectifying them as it had nothing to do with me. 

We are on the bus, sitting right in the middle, where the front and rear parts of the bus 

connects and folds like a harmonica. Kamile is wearing colorful vertical patterned shirt: 

white, blue, yellow, red. The chairs are blue. Kamile raises her eyebrows, glances to the 

right side and then turns to the camera: 

- A man is eating on a bus. I want to steal his food. Am I normal? Kamile, 21 years old. 

The camera turns to the man sitting a little further, he is chewing scrumptiously, 

scratching his ear and staring at the ceiling.

I remember that day as a cobalt blue that I associated with an air conditioner in a bus, 

vertical pattern of the shirt and folds in the background pops up into my memory as a 

barcode. In painting blue color can symbolise peace, eternity, holiness, perhaps blue 

can also be interpreted as a symbol of glory or divine. Kamiles face expression is unclear, 

frightened or anxious look in her eyes is combined with a slighty smiling mouth. 

Painting no longer says: Am I normal? Kamile, 21 years old“. Rather than documenting 

painting process is greatly increasing the distance from the past event, making it into 

something else. Image translation error occurs and a painting might become a generalized 

substitude of the past event but not it’s representation. In fact, neither the photograph 

nor the painting informs about a specific past event. The character of Kamile 

could be interpreted as a human factor that connects the painting with a specific period 

of time, but I do not bear nostalgia for the past through painting. The narrative of the 

past is replaced by a visual narrative, which relates to the state of the present / painting 

action more than anything else.

Donata Minderytė 

Am I Normal? Kamile, 21 years old. 

180x210cm, oil on canvas, 2019

66 

XII YPP 

PRIZE 

WINNER 

Elena Antanavičiūtė / LT 

Belly. 


www.instagram.com/elenaantanaviciute 

X I I Y P P P R I Z E W I N N E R 

I’m going to lie down on Sun & Sea: Marina beach, and of course I didn’t want to at 

first, I thought it would be enough to just watch, but I was persuaded. Among other 

volunteers, I meet an American and her kids who talks about how her kindergarten age 

children have been waiting for half a year to participate in this performance and how 

they (children) are interested and concerned about climate change (this part is not 

about my topic, just the context). It turns out that my swimsuit is the wrong color and 

I will have to put on one of those provided at the spot. Neverminded that I had verified 

with the organizers ahead of time that my swimsuit was acceptable! Wearing a 

swimsuit that is not mine seems like a nightmare to me. I choose a swimsuit that, in my 

painter’s eyes, is similar to my original bluish one that was rejected. However, I manage 

to avoid the deadly shame and fit into the aforementioned swimsuit. On the beach, I 

read the only book I picked up that I decided I should read because maybe something 

would be useful for my master’s and that I didn’t start reading until I came to the beach. 

The decisive criterion for choosing a book for a trip to Venice was its soft cover and 

how light it was. So, with somewhat mesmerizing, repetitive music in the background, 

I read Naomi Wolf’s The Beauty Myth and try to keep parts of my body from falling 

out of the swimsuit. I am pretty sure that the music of this opera in my head will always 

be associated with the book I read and the unfortunate swimsuit. The book says that 

unattainable beauty standards are used against women, and I am currently struggling 

with the unfortunate swimsuit. In the meantime, another volunteer from Italy (whose suit 

color didn’t meet the requirements, but she probably didn’t think it was a big tragedy, 

maybe?) invites me to play badminton, or rather to go and hit a shuttlecock because 

most likely neither one of us knows the rules of badminton. Although there is no wind, I 

am not doing very well, maybe because I am fighting against the ill-fitted swimsuit, my 

body, or maybe because I have not held a racket for a long time. Thus, this is a story 

that involves the body and feminist literature, and it is taking place against an artistic 

background.

68 

Elija Grybytė / LT 

Underwater Breaking necks. 

90x120cm, oil & spray paint on canvas, 2020 

www.elijagrybe.com 


Elija’s paintings use brutal images from MMA fights and wrestling matches to help 

articulate self-assertion and dignity in abuse survival. The artworks open conversations 

about violence and show, gender identity, masculinity, and control over one’s own body 

in the Digital age. 

Painting ‘Underwater Breaking Necks’ is a work from the series Parasite Paintings exploring 

Bodily disconnection in the Digital age. It creates a violent sensation of being a 

parasite inside one’s own body. Tapeworm imagery collaged with a distorted organic 

shape emphasizes the sensation of losing control. The digital invasion of information 

acts as a parasitic microorganism formed to give up its own liberty for the safety of the 

flesh. The brightly coloured, fleshy figures express emotional and physical violence, while 

more graphic, flat areas of the canvas show the aesthetics of the Digital age. This contrasting 

visual effect explores the disorienting feeling of Gender Dysphoria, especially in 

the Digital age, where bodies can become a digital spectacle. 

The fleshy figures in the painting are inspired by an image taken from a wrestling scene. 

There is a certain curiosity about photos of wrestling and fighting. Images of violence 

on digital media, controlled and mimicked fights all have a certain oddness to it. As a 

sexual abuse survivor, fighting helped the Elija take control over their body by giving the 

frames to train and explore the brutality of it. Competitive fight reflects the violent human 

condition and the ability to play by the rules.

70 

Justīne Seile-Urtāne / LV 

Night shift. 


www.facebook.com/justineseileart 


Dirrect glances, strange conversations, weird men, histerical groups of girls. Nights 

have merged togethet as one foggy dream. Weaks have turned in months. which day 

is today, I couldn’t tell, I’m inbetween worlds somewhere in dream somewhere between 

strangers who whants to know what is sad girl thinking about. 

My body is shiftin trought colorful darkness. sleeples nights, intoxicating days. Somewhere 

between classical and pop. Fake smiles, fake bodies, fake dreams. I queation my 

reality and my values in the dark, dark night with my eyes wide open. I am here in my 

bubble I am where they don’t want me to be. 

Do I know who I am, who am I? I’m a daughter a sister and a wife. I am a bartender 

and a student, I’m a cleaning lady in office building near by, I’m a dreamer. As I look in 

my own reflection in the the window next to me I see a strong woman.

72 

Kadi Reintamm / EE 

Prison in three layers. 

130x163cm, watercolor on paper, 2020 


Past years I have worked with organizing my personal chaos throught my art practice. 

I Have been working with topics like boredom, loneliness, depressioon and inequality 

in sociaty even before the crisis in spring brought all these issues into daylight, making 

them more relevant than ever as isolation was amplifying the feeling of helplessness 

through repetition. 

Series of watercolors, which I started in 2019, is called I must cope with it, the sizes of 

the watercolors vary from small (31x23cm) representing a personal sphere and going 

big (~130cmx160cm) the more general they are, representing the walls we build as 

a person, but also overall the fragmentation of the sociaty through decreased sense 

of community. In these series I started working on different personal topics like mental 

health, ADHD, social oppression, poverty and of course the time lacking and nerve 

wracking survival in the City isolation with kids. I was unable to solve all the problems in 

our family and work life, so I was left with endless feeling of “I am not enough”. 

Members of a privileged society had the opportunity to gain benefit of so called free 

time, but families with children were left with an impossible compromize between work 

and family duties. Especially vunerable are poor families, unemployed and women who 

have totake care of the elderly and multiple children. So I started questioning inequality 

in the society, as I was feeling deprived and therefore totally hopless. Deprived are the 

ones who have lost something, that others have, but in the lack of opportunities have 

difficulties managing the problem they have to deal with. In the times of crisis we need 

all the help we could get, but if there you have no community to depend on you start 

to sink very quick. Feeling the absurdity of the situation, when on the one hand I was 

driven by maternal empathy and a sense of duty, on the other hand by a feminist in me 

wishing to fight all inequality, I found myself increasingly dreaming of an utopian equal 

society.

74 

Kaur Mäepalu / EE 

Geometric Space I. 

130x250cm, airbrush & aerosol pray on canvas, 2020 


At the moment I am working on constructing different spaces where on the highest level 

of importantance stand composition, rythm, colour and form. I try to manipulate with the 

viewer’s senses, which makes them wander around or instead find the nearest exit from 

the world I have created. The spaces and situations portrayed should confuse the 

viewer. I create new situations rather than repeat the already existing. 

„Geometric Space I“ focuses on the room surrounding us and distorting different objects 

I have combined with my inner world or space which is mainly the cause of the impulse. 

Two constructed figures step-by-step create the world surrounding them, me just being 

the medium supplying them with variations of colours and shapes. In cooperation the 

decisions are easier to make. The detailed linework indicates the systematical thought 

process of the figures.

76 

Kazimieras Brazdžiūnas / LT 

RUDD. 

210x180cm, printing ink & aerosol spray on canvas, 2020 

www.instagram.com/kminimaliai 


Tired of the flow of visual information and having experimented with various techniques 

in painting, I came to the conclusion that there is no place for me in conventional 

painting. I understood that when I acknowledged my habit of colouring, painting, questioning 

and contradicting myself without finding a coherent creative course, since certain 

influences and my own stubbornness put me in a certain airtight state and did 

not result in what I expected. As I mentioned before, I still tend to stick to the “painter” 

label. Still, as an artist who works with aerosol paint, when explaining my creative path, 

I must refine some of the fundamental values that would acquaint the viewer with the 

current situation on my path. 

The choice of aerosol paint came logically and naturally due to its quick and effective 

performance and direct reference to graffiti, the beginnings of which can be traced 

back to ancient Egypt. Modern graffiti, which originated in the 1970s in the United 

States as a form of protest, vandalism, or simply perpetuation, directly affects me as 

a creator. However, the book “Sprayed since 1929 – 2015” states that the first artist to 

use spray paint was Paul Klee, in his “Seltsames Theather” (1929). Thus, little by little 

new possibilities for the use of spray paint started to appear in traditional painting, by 

the likes of Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy Warhol, Sigmar Polke, Julian Schnabel, Keith 

Haring, Sterling Ruby and others. In modern Instagram culture, artists who use this 

technique are sometimes called “post-vandals”, the creative direction itself is called 

“post-vandalism”. The informal, unconfirmed terminology / concept that describes such 

(anti)painting intrigues me and resonates directly with my chosen creative direction and 

motives, which I analyse in my chosen form of expression. 

The motives I choose can sometimes be seen as cliché, but in popular culture they still 

find their place as icons, symbols, signs and references to a particular event or place. It 

is no coincidence that I sometimes rely on religious motifs, representing faith not only in 

images but also in art itself. I usually use a central composition and large formats, thus 

giving the painting an impression of monumentality and grandeur; in my depersonalized 

“touch” I give the ease with which I seek to create an ambiguous effect, the tension 

between the motive and its performance, in which destructive moods are apparent. 

Therefore, at this stage of my work, I will continue to strive to balance between metaphor 

and specific reference, painting and graffiti. Dissolving layers of spray paint create 

the impression of reality/uncertainty and painting/anti- painting.

78 

Laura Aizporiete / LV 

Look Down. 



Creation of this work took place in rather unusual emotional and physical conditions. It 

was created in May, when most of the world’s society experienced an unprecedented 

time - a pandemic. People faced varios limitations of physical and emotional space. 

As a result, playing on the characteristic of this unusual time - “Lock Down” mode, this 

painting called “Look Down” was created. In its aesthetics and plot, it reflects alienation 

both physical and emotional.

80 

Līga Kalniņa / LV 

VIBES. 

145x185cm, mix media on canvas - collage of my sketches, 

acrylic, watercolor, oil paint, varnish, and hot glue, 2020 

www.facebook.com/liga.kalninaart.5 


Conception-story about my artwork: This artwork is about water that unites as all. No 

matter with what background of social status, political interests, or religious beliefs. 

Message of water landscape and human figures and portraits in it includes distanced 

identity metaphysics. it is about our soul and life mission: To leave good works after our 

time to make universal time more valuable. My artistic ideas interact with my experience 

and time. I am interested in depth and clarity of expression. I like to explore 

monumental shape, space, scale, and speed. My goal in art is to create my own story 

of this time, capturing timeless emotions and passions.

82 

Martina Kryževičiūtė / LT 

The bright future of ,,Spring Grove’’ Hospital. 

100x165cm, canvas & mixed media, 2020 


,,The bright future of Spring Grove hospital’’ is a first part from the set that consists 

of seven paintings. It visualises the scene from M. Pollan’s book “How to Change the 

Mind”. 

The work series depicts a scene from a real-life project at Spring Grove psychiatric 

hospital which includes a psychedelic research program my subjects are going through. 

The study participants are the patients suffering from mental disorders or addictions. 

The overall picture is seen from the position of another person involved in the research. 

Therefore reality is distorted, it emerges through altered and unrealistic perspective, 

size relations, atmosphere or symbols. All of this destroys the reality of the historical fact 

itself.

84 


SPECIAL 

PRIZE 

Samanta Augutė / LT 

Storm. 

21x30cm, watercolor on paper, 2020 

www.instagram.com/saaugute 

X I I Y P P S P E C I A L P R I Z E 

The main artwork represents a moment of a stormy, chaotic and wild weather by which 

all of the characters are affected.The main character ( yellow coated man ) is caught 

by this storm, yet, he is running forward in a calm manner. There are little human-like 

figures around him (he is probably running towards them). His hands are disproportionately 

large, marked by red and blue fingers. These traits make him look almost like 

a wizard. Large hands and a figure leaning forward symbolizes a person who wants to 

help those little people in trouble depicted in the painting. I created this painting to metaphorically 

perpetuate an important personal experience. Yet it definitely speaks to all 

of the people who were “struck by a storm” the past year by all the events they had no 

control over. It also resembles the brave doctors who are saving people by risking their 

own well - being.

86 


SPECIAL 

PRIZE 

Sonata Riepšaitė / LT 

Dormant Fountain. 

110x125cm, charcoal & varnish on canvas, 2019 

www.sonatariepsaite.com 

X I I Y P P S P E C I A L P R I Z E 

A landscape holds a special feeling in itself. It holds memories of different spaces and 

time that feels almost motionless. In the present moment imagination merge with present 

and connect these feelings into a landscape. A landscape becomes not just physical 

but embodies my memories, experience and identity. 

I compose imaginary landscapes of the real ones that I experienced, read, heard about 

or accidentally saw a picture of. These random bits and pieces that I collect of these 

landscapes correspond my memories of real landscapes and visions of non existent 

ones and help me express my subjective worldview. All the pieces are picked intuitively, 

but composed consciously. The experience of a landscape unfolds in many different 

forms and layers. I experience, see and read about it, hear the landscape itself and 

about it. All the different ways of approaching the landscape allows me to get more 

information about it and use all of it for inspiration. 

This is my attempt to think the landscape.

LT 

LV 

EE 

2 

0 

2 

0 

H I G H L Y L I S T E D 

P A R T I C I P A N T S :

ANASTASIJA BIKOVA 

ANNA KÕUHKNA 

ARNOLDS ANDERSONS 

ARTA RAITUMA 

AURELIJA BULAUKAITĖ 

BENEDIKTAS ŽUKAS 

DANEL KAHAR & GRISLI SOPPE-KAHAR 

DARIYA SUBBOTKINA 

DOVILĖ BAGDONAITĖ 

GABRIELĖ ALEKSĖ 

GODA LUKAITĖ 

INESE MANGUSE 

JEGORS BUIMISTERS 

KATRINA KOLK 

KELLI GEDVIL 

LAURA SLAVINSKAITĖ 

LINAS KAZIULIONIS 

LINDA LAGZDINA 

MARIJA RINKEVIČIŪTĖ 

MONIKA KUČIAUSKAITĖ 

MONIKA RADŽIŪNAITĖ 

OLESJA SEMENKOVA 

PAULA ZVANE 

POVILAS ČEPKAUSKAS 

RAIDO RANDOJA 

RŪTA MATULEVIČIŪTĖ 

SANDRA KVILYTĖ 

SAULĖ ŠALTYTĖ 

TADAS TRUCILAUSKAS 

ŽIVILĖ MINKUTĖ

Anastasija Bikova / LV 

Spirit locked up in the black space. 

300x300cm, sepia, acrylic, oil on canvas, 2020

Anna Kõuhkna / EE 

The new circle. 150x200cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Arta Raituma / LV 

Manifesto. The gate is open. 40x40cm, acrylic & graphite on burnt plywood, 2020

Arnolds Andersons / LV 

Hearts & minds. 150x125cm, acrylic on canvas, 2020

Aurelija Bulaukaitė / LT 

The portal. 50x70cm, oil on canvas, spray paint, 2020

Benediktas Žukas / LT 

Les fleurs du mal. 135x135cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Danel Kahar & Grisli Soppe-Kahar / EE 

Making different rules. Dark room. Up at night. 170x322x5cm, acrylic & coffee on cardboard, 2020

Dariya Subbotkina / EE 

Burden. 22x30cm, oil on paper, 2020 

Linda Lagzdina / LV 

Layer 20-6. 70x70cm, makeup on primed pvh panel

Dovilė Bagdonaitė / LT 

Passtoorrrrrralllllllllll. Kiiiiite runnnnnning. 222x322cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Gabrielė Aleksė / LT 

The Eye. 100x80cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Katrina Kolk / EE 

Loneliness is true self-love. 65x90cm, acrylic painting on canvas, 2020

Inese Manguse / LV 

Family egg tempera on gesso. 40x53cm, 2020

Jegors Buimisters / LV 

Perturbatio Aeterna (Vasily Rozanov). 120x95cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Goda Lukaitė / LT 

A Circle. 100x110cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Kelli Gedvil / EE 

Pores - Blur - Brighten. 70x50cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Povilas Čepkauskas / LT 

Brush with violence. 100x130cm, acrylic on canvas, 2020

Laura Slavinskaitė / LT 

Notes. 20x20cm, oil on canvas, 2019-2020

Marija Rinkevičiūtė / LT 

A hand cloth. 30x50cm, painting, photography on batiste hanged on a metal wire. 2019 

Linas Kaziulionis / LT 

Housework. 90x70cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Monika Kučiauskaitė / LT 

Hidden transparency. 76x61cm, acrylic on canvas, 2020

Monika Radžiūnaitė / LT 

Polis duobus continentur, sine altero non. 120x100cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Olesja Semenkova / EE 

Madonna. 45x55cm, mixed media, 2020

Paula Zvane / LV 

Fragile & protected. 10x10x4cm, oil & watercolor on canvas, soap, 2020

Raido Randoja / EE 

Umesh & Avi. 80x60cm, oil on panel, 2019

Sandra Kvilytė / LT 

Nothing left to see. 140x200cm, mixed technique, 2020 

Rūta Matulevičiūtė / LT 

Nijolė Šiaučiūnienė with her granddaughter Adelė. 180x100cm, oil on canvas, 2020

Saulė Šaltytė / LT 

Blooming. 150x160cm, fabric ink.

Tadas Trucilauskas / LT 

Gates of Empirea. 5,85x165x185cm

Živilė Minkutė / LT 

Mortal. 240x150cm, mixed technique, 2019

All Participants of Young Painter Prize 2020: 

www.ypp.lt/2020

XII Young Painter Prize Book

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