The Rothko Museum, in collaboration with the GallerySIVIA, invites applications for the 13th International Latgale Graphic Art Symposium, taking place from 10–22 March 2025 in Daugavpils, Latvia.
This prestigious symposium serves as a dynamic platform for artistic exchange, bringing together leading graphic artists from around the world. Over the years, it has hosted more than 100 participants from nearly 40 countries, significantly contributing to the development of the graphic medium in the Latgale Region.
When: 10–22 March 2025 Where: Rothko Museum, Daugavpils, Latvia Who Can Apply: 10 professional artists will be selected through a competition based on submitted application materials (application form, CV, and portfolio).
Be part of this esteemed international event celebrating innovation and excellence in printmaking.
The second part of the 18th International Vilnius Painting Triennial opened on October 3rd at the “Titanikas” gallery, featuring two exhibitions: a Baltic artists’ collection curated by Meda Norbutaitė and Arvydas Žalpys and “Inner Worlds,” showcasing Nordic and Baltic Young Artists Awards nominees.
The Baltic artists’ showcase emphasizes regional trends in contemporary painting, with works addressing existential themes and societal reflections. Latvian artists Andris Vītolinš, Māris Čačka, and Sigita Daugule are prominently featured, alongside counterparts from Estonia and Lithuania, highlighting their unique contributions to the evolving art dialogue within the region.
This exhibition is an important platform for cultural exchange and artistic comparison across Baltic countries, reinforcing Latvia’s active engagement in the international art scene.
The latest exhibition title from the artist Māris Čačka is yet another enigmatic wordplay. Fitting the artist’s playful style like the proverbial hand in a glove, it lends his latest output a certain semantic direction while leaving ample room for individual interpretation by an open-minded viewer.
As an alternative, the title may have been conceived as an allusion to the famous Latin parenthesis inter alia (incidentally, among other things). This reading adds another layer of intrigue and leads the viewer down another path of speculation and reflection on what the author meant to say and what associative train of thought his work suggests.
In his dynamic daily life, among so many other things, the artist seeks and values meaningful experiences of encounter with and being among others. He thrives in the supportive company of similarly minded people, such as his colleagues and dear friends, who will recharge his creativity and feed the silent conversation that unfolds between the artist and his work.
The Museum of Zarasai Region will exhibit multi-layered and colourful works on watercolour paper, an offshoot of the artist’s hallmark format of abstracted colour fields on canvas. On a smaller, more intimate scale, they show the author’s current placement and social connectivity in the spacetime continuum.
Māris Čačka’s solo exhibition, “Acceptance,” is on display at the Ventspils Museum, The Castle of the Livonian Order, from July 6th to September 15th, 2024.
An artist’s skin
They say self-acceptance means feeling good in one’s skin. For an artist, their skin is their canvas or paper, extremely thin and vulnerable to harm. Perhaps this is the reason it is so assiduously painted, as if for camouflage.
In his reflective commentary on the exhibition title, Čačka says: “Acceptance ties to the persistent habit of self-questioning and doubt. Your mind keeps asking if you’re ever good enough and perfectly accepted when and where you want. It seeks to know how consequential it is for you to be accepted and how other people feel about acceptance in their lives. All these reflections are forever jostling in your head… Beyond that are other forms of acceptance, such as feasting and celebrating life. Being able to make it happen for yourself and others. Acceptance as being accepted by and accepting of others… Those are my functional keywords.”
“Acceptance” by Māris Čačka comes to the Ventspils Museum’s Livonian Order Castle in mid-summer and midway through the exhibition season at the castle’s gallery space, where the latest solo project was “Heading towards the Unknown” by Kaspars Zariņš and where the current cycle will conclude with paintings by Aija Zariņa. But now, “Acceptance” shines on all three castle floors with brand-new artworks and a series of prints the artist made expressly for this venue.
Čačka’s visual vocabulary is consistently abstract. Jubilant acrylic splashing across a darker canvas background and offsetting playful experiments with the material in prints on mirror surfaces. The artist’s inner child playing in peaceful contentment. The multi-coloured fireworks, however, hold a secret, the clues for which the artist leaves in cryptic titles. I like to think they are abbreviations. That MMA stands for My Mother Aina and TM for Tuesday’s Mayhem. I’m only joking, but it’s wonderful that Čačka’s artworks have their secrets, and I will let them stay that way. Because what can be more exciting than to keep scanning colour fields and be delighted by a flash of an elusive tiger or some other fleeting shape. The artist’s enigmatic concept is so charming, a private secret that resists disclosure.
“Reflections” (40×40, 2024), a standalone series shown on the third gallery floor, echoes the theme of the sweeping “RR” made in acrylic on canvas (190×190, 2024) – a black rain starting on the canvas and continuing in congreve print. Perhaps it represents the sorrows of the world continuously raining on the artist’s skin in tiny rivulets that leave distinctly lighter, washed-out trails in the emergent piece. This figurative rain is yet another version of acceptance, where every feeling and experience will have its place.
Although the artist is an active public figure and holds a key administrative post as the Rothko Museum’s director, his creativity flows with abundance. Čačka’s extensive exhibition record dates back to 2001. Since then, it has swelled to 34 solo exhibitions, of which 19 were held domestically while 13 spanned international venues in Lithuania, Germany, Poland, China and Belarus. Čačka is an eager and regular contributor to plein airs and artist residencies, not least at the Ventspils Museum. The latest highlights of his curatorial and organisational record are the Valdis Bušs International Painting Plein Air (creative producer since 2017), the International Latgale Graphic Art Symposium (curator since 2012) and the Silva Linarte International Painting Symposium (curator in 2019 and 2020).
The Surnadal Billag residency offers two artists a ten-day stay. They work in spacious studios that enable them to create monumental works.
Māris Čačka – artist, curator and director of the world-renowned Rothko Museum in Daugavpils, Latvia – has developed a unique hybrid method of abstract expression that integrates painting and graphics. His works are multi-layered in technique and content, unfolding as imaginary dialogues between the artist and his contemporaries about the meaning of the world today. Čačka’s creative expression is free and intuitive, as he aims for emotional harmony in himself and the finished artwork. Thus, he is equally open to largely decorative construction and a profound symbolic message contained in such elements as colour, darkness and light, and their rhythmical structures emerging on the canvas plain. At Surnadal Billag, Čačka creates his third work on a brick wall. Taking full use of the excellent location that offers opportunities for large-scale expression, he conveys his sense of Norwegian nature. His residency output captures fragments of stunning Norwegian mountains and breath-taking waterfalls. Latvia is a flat country, without mountains, so he finds waterfalls both fascinating and intensely inspirational.
Beate Gjersvold is an artist and art historian based in Trondheim, where she has her studio at Rotvoll Kunstnerkollektiv. She works on parts of her current project on Nordmøre, has an address on Ertsvågsøya, Aure, and is a member of BKMR (Biletkunstnarane Møre og Romsdal). Her project is to immerse herself in the concept of TIME, which she conveys through paintings, installations, photography, video installations, and text. In Nordmøre, she carves out rocks, minerals and crystals, which become installations that are shown together with paintings. During her stay in Surnadal this time, she works with paintings using a special watercolour technique with real minerals.
Both artists draw inspiration from nature and their surroundings during their stay.
Here, the two artists have a dialogue with their art, where colours, lines and genuine emotions talk together.
From 8 to 22 March, the Rothko Museum in cooperation with SIVIA hosted the twelfth International Latgale Graphic Art Symposium, which brought together artists from Poland, France, Croatia, Italy, Estonia, Latvia, and Taiwan.
The Latgale Graphic Art Symposium is a unique phenomenon in the country’s art scene, physically and figuratively grounded in a particular geographical region of Latvia and known for its broad international outreach. Its idea and concept belong to Association SIVIA, which has ably run the symposium since its inception in 2013 as part of the Rothko Museum’s residency programme. Through its dedication to nurturing creativity and promoting artistic exchange, the symposium remains a solid support and networking platform for eminent graphic artists. On the verge of its twelfth iteration, the forum continues to be a magnet for creators worldwide. Its first eleven rounds have already brought together more than a hundred printmakers from forty-plus countries.
A jury of experts selected ten artists for the 2024 symposium team, which includes Magda Szplit (Poland), Henryk Krolikowski (Poland), Peili Huang (Taiwan), Vitalia Samuilova (France), Lorenzo Natali (Italy), Edvin Dragičević (Croatia), Kadri Toom (Estonia), Pascal Pignon Jaf (France), Anna Kłos (Poland), and Oksana Vronska (Latvia).
The artists drew inspiration from the city of Daugavpils to create original contemporary artworks in the printmaking medium on the topic of Time, which had been named the umbrella theme for this year’s symposium programme that featured artist presentations, workshops, master classes, and field trips.
The XII International Latgale Graphic Art Symposium closed at 4 p.m. on 22 March at the Rothko Museum with a group exhibition celebrating the participants’ new creative output.
The “In Between” solo exhibition by Māris Čačka, currently on display at the Im. Slendzińskich Gallery in Bialystok until 31 March 2024, offers a compelling exploration of the artist’s unique perspective on existence and personal involvement.
Curated by Ewa Pietruszko and Ewa Targońska, with coordination by Katarzyna Renata Hryszko, the exhibition delves into the concept of being “in between” – a liminal space filled with events, impressions, and people. Čačka eloquently articulates this theme, stating, “Time and time again I find myself in between, in a liminal space full of events, impressions and people.”
For Čačka, this state of “in between” encapsulates the essence of his presence and participation in life’s processes. It symbolizes a nuanced balance between various roles and experiences, where he oscillates between observation and action, introspection and engagement. Through his artwork, he seeks to capture the vibrancy of this intermediary space, where meaningful encounters and reflections converge to shape his artistic expression.
From February 13th to March 15th, an exhibition of Mara Čačka’s paintings titled “Other Notes” is on display at the Krāslava Culture House. The vibrant, large-format works, created in the artist’s unique technique blending graphics and painting, adorn the foyer and exhibition hall of the cultural venue.
Artist Māris Čačka describes his works as expressions of the most unimaginable states of the soul, commenting on people and situations through a poetic lens. Born in 1976 in Varakļāni, Čačka holds a Master’s degree in Fine Arts and a Ph.D. in Pedagogy from Daugavpils University. He currently leads the Daugavpils Mark Rothko Art Centre (now Rothko Museum) and has an extensive background in academia and arts administration.
On March 15th at 4:00 PM, there will be a meet-and-greet session with the artist, inviting all interested individuals to engage with Čačka and his artistic journey.
On January 19th, the seminar “Communication of Art and Creating Public Awareness of Contemporary Art” took place in the seminar space of the Rothko Museum in Daugavpils. Māris Čačka discussed the importance of citizen involvement in art processes, particularly emphasizing communication about and with art, and highlighting the insufficient documentation of contemporary art in the region.
The presentation addressed:
The challenges of interpreting and communicating works of art for those outside the art field.
The impact of constant information distractions, often referred to as multitasking conditions, which significantly hinder the understanding of art messages.
The program featured concrete examples, stories, and reflections based on experiences with European art.
This event was organized by the association “Cita Daugavpils” as part of the “Cultural Sustainability Capacity Strengthening Program,” supported by the State Cultural Capital Foundation. The seminar was a collaboration with DVPI “Vienības nams” and DVPI “Rothko Museum.”
SIVIA 