Starting the new autumn exhibition season, Vilnius city gallery "Meno niša" invites everyone on September 5, at 18 p.m., to the installation exhibition of artist Jelena Škulis "Pause. At the war river" opening. This exhibition is part of the artist's autoethnographic research, which takes place through the observation of ourselves and those around us in our shared emotional and geopolitical spaces.
The main installation of the exhibition is a work as long as 10 meters, made with computerized threading machines, but woven by hand. Each thread of the installation is cut and put together by hand. Jelena Škulis started weaving this work in October 2022 and finished it only a week before the opening of the exhibition.
"Pause. By the war river" is J. Škulis's eighth personal exhibition and the first in Vilnius city gallery "Art Niša". According to Sonata Baliuckaitė, the curator of the exhibition, the artist is a bright artist who has been visible on the Lithuanian art scene for a long time.
"Jelena is a creator of interdisciplinary art, currently representing the field of textile art. I have come across her work more than once, both at the art fair "ArtVilnius" and when curating other group exhibitions. The concept of textiles, both in modern art and in ancient art, is very broad. In Jelena's work, I associate textiles with tactility, with a slow and performative creative process: be it weaving, embroidery, or "knitting" from words. Words and texts are important in her works, but they are encoded using the possibilities of textile and graphic art. The artist reacts sensitively to topical, painful, as well as universal or humane topics, she involves the viewer in the process, she is interested in his emotions and experiences", said Sonata Baliuckaitė, curator of the exhibition.
The main exhibition "Pause. The content of the fabric of the work "At the river of war" is a sequence of repeated words with pauses. J. Škulis heard these words from an interview with a girl from Ukraine. She described her current life with the words "war", "tears" and that she lives "waiting". The artist arranged these words, originally spoken in Ukrainian, in various sequences in a slow physical timeline with pauses or almost legible.
"I feel how the war dissolves into everyday life. Holidays, studies, loved ones. I suspect I want to deny the weariness of it along with the knowledge that it continues and unfortunately will continue. But with a new reminder, he is distracted by a strong wave. How do I stay, create, work, love in that uncontrollable but real fog of war? With hope and constant anticipation of its end. This is my question to each of the viewers and an attempt to answer it myself in the flowing river of time and works", - said the artist herself about the future exhibition and its theme.
"Many people have asked why I use the Ukrainian language?" It is often confused with Russian. Some, observing the process, ask: "Why do you weave in Russian?" For me, it is an opportunity to physically feel and understand something other than my own language and thinking. And I myself keep experiencing that the war must end, that there must be a pause, constantly asking how we survive the current everyday life", said J. Škulis.
Jelena Škulis is an artist and researcher whose work is based on the material and the relationship with the community. The artist has a degree in social sciences Vilnius University and visual arts at the Vilnius Academy of Arts, uses various methods in his creations: slow weaving, handwork, everyday language, performative action, surveys, community involvement in the creative process.
Jelena's works and community projects were presented in Italy, Portugal, France, in Latvia, in Ukraine, in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and other countries. Two of its projects involving local communities, Add. Dictated and BoringArt received a scholarship from the Lithuanian Council of Culture. J. Škulis is also an art doctoral student at the Vilnius Academy of Arts. Using an autoethnographic approach, she explores the connections and disconnections between material creation and community.
J. Škulis exhibition "Pause. Near the war river" in the Vilnius city gallery "Art Niša" will be open from September 5 to October 20. Sponsor of the gallery - Vilnius city municipality. The exhibition is part of the "Vilnius 700" program.
