Meno Parkas Gallery is thrilled to make its third appearance at the Viennacontemporary art fair. In our booth, you can see the works of four esteemed artists in Lithuania and abroad: Žilvinas Lanzdbergas, Aušra Vaitkūnienė, Arūnas Gudaitis, and Patricija Jurkšaitytė. Through their works, these artists show an exploration of control, decay, and temporality, intertwined with historical artifacts.
Our booth layout has been carefully crafted to remind you of a stroll through the baroque gardens of Austria. Throughout time, magnificent parks have symbolized opulence and authority.
Aušra Vaitkūnienė's distorted landscapes and Patricija Jurkšaitytė's critique of consumerism are painful reminders of the environmental degradation and social inequality plaguing the continent. Vaitkūnienė's paintings are intertwined with paradoxical images, reminiscent not only of Viennese parks. These artificially distorted landscapes question the reality of nature and how often it is domesticated, stripped of its inherent wildness, and turned into a spectacle for human pleasure. In other paintings, the disappearing busts are a representation and preservation of the deterioration of cultural heritage.
Jurkšaitytė's leather thujas, strategically positioned within the booth, not only imitate luxury but also draw attention to the toll of consumerism. The artist deliberately chooses materials associated with opulence, mimicking the grandeur found in the aesthetics of Viennese gardens and palaces. On the other hand, the mobile objects she has produced, "leather thujas", enable her to easily transform any space, creating desired moods and "images" both in domestic interiors and in any exhibition space, alongside other artworks.
The works of Žilvinas Landzbergas and Arūnas Gudaitis are a distorted reflection of Europe's fractured identity and declining cultural heritage. Landzbergas's sculptures of fragmented heads further accentuate the theme of existential decay. The artist's photographs (images of an installation realized in Amsterdam) – part of a lost history of art (broken, forgotten, sculptural parts collected and brought from various places) – capture the moment of destruction of historical artifacts. Žilvinas's works form a symbiotic relationship with Jurkšaitytė's leather thujas. At the same time, they catalyze a discourse on the transience of aesthetics, wealth, and authority.
Arūnas Gudaitis brings the intersection of tradition. His work "Plaster Bust of Socrates with the Beard Shaved by The Sculptor," alongside a large-format photo of a "timeless" sundial, questions traditional notions of representation. Gudaitis' work seeks to reconsider the significance of classical imagery in contemporary discourse. A slide projection (an artwork in the fair is available in video format) about the Vienna Ice Cream Parlour presented at the stand speaks of the fact that every century brings its own "idols", which are quite different from the cultural idols of the past.
Gallery's Meno Parkas participation at the viennacontemporary 2024 is financed by the Lithuanian Council for Culture.
