The Last Pizza Slice

Just recently, i.e. in 2017, I graduated from Vilnius Academy of Arts and was awarded with a Bachelor’s Degree in Painting. In 2018 I organised my first personal exhibition. I was raised by parents who are both artists. My Dad is a painter and my Mum is a piano teacher. Thus ever since my childhood I could witness works of art being born. Being just a little kid I already enjoyed drawing with pencils and painting with gouache. When I had trouble sleeping at night my mum would leave me with a bunch of pencils, gouaches and paper sheets. That’s how my art started. When I was at school, long before my graduation I already knew that I’m going to be an artist. Therefore before entering the academy, I went to Vilnius Justinas Vienožinskis School of Art for three years. Being at this school I started realising that painting helps me to relax and enables me to live in my own unique world. I love colours and I like my hands being covered in various shades. When I paint I forget about routine, about everyday life and create my own little world where I feel very happy.

Cycle of paintings “Fiesta”

I portray feast as traces of personal experiences and individual’s existential experiences. Paintings in this cycle are united by decorative, poster-like plastic based on bright colour contrasts. It is related to pop art and in certain cases – expressionism and surrealism and resembles shots of animation or comic pictures. The paintings in this cycle portray images related to the theme of feast – circus tents, acrobatic stunts, stylized pictures.

I use oil painting technique. In order to express uneasy and dramatic aspects of feast I also use coal for object contouring. I paint not only on traditional canvas but also on cotton sheets that I cut out myself and mount them on stretcher bars. This helps me to portray the autobiographic aspect of circus life and to symbolically reflect everyday life of travelling artists. Painting over patterns and factures of fabric or using them as backgrounds, lines or ornaments helped me to expand the boundaries of my works because in this case I used a ready-made item.