Virginija Kirvelienė | Streetwritings
On Friday, April 4th, at 6 PM, we invite you to the opening of textile artist Virginija Kirvelienė’s personal exhibition “Streetwritings” at the Lithuanian Artists’ Association Gallery “Arka”.
Walking through the city, we often step over manhole covers – these largely unnoticed mediators between the city and its underground pipeline world. Manholes are like openings to enclosed spaces, functioning as access points for utilities, marking the infrastructure zones of urban life. These markers of water supply, sewage, telephone networks, and heating routes with their territorial and utilitarian purposes have become a kind of “creative territory” for Virginija Kirvelienė. Later, she “appropriated” the textures of adjacent sidewalks as well. Having gradually discovered a unique printing technique in the urban environment, she not only replicates the forms of objects but transforms them into epicenters of experience. These directly printed “portraits” of streets, which have absorbed the energy of people walking on them for many years, create distinctive narratives, becoming poetic reflections and spaces for dialogue.
The main character in the exhibition’s works is time. It is inscribed in cracked and chipped surfaces of the prints, ornaments, and informational text structures. The artist values the pressing process, which records a frozen frame of everyday life in the print, simultaneously marking both presence and a moment of the past. Through modest urban motifs – impressions of manhole covers and sidewalk surfaces and their metamorphoses – the exhibition develops themes of the city’s historical memory and time. The manhole object also conceals a bundle of period information: its purpose, manufacturing locations and dates, and other codes become apparent. As a contrast to heavy cast iron, soft cotton and paper fibers are used for prints. In this way, significant city “landscapes” become part of our cultural context, while the material fragility of some prints symbolically highlights the temporality and decay of human existence.
The exhibition at the “Arka” gallery will run until April 27th.
Photography and filming may take place during the opening event. By participating in the event, you agree that your image may be published through the gallery’s distribution channels for the purpose of promoting the exhibition.
The exhibition is part of the Lithuanian Artists’ Association and “Arka” gallery’s creative program and the Lithuanian Artists’ Association’s 90th anniversary program.
The organization’s strategic activities are financed by the Lithuanian Council for Culture.
