The exhibition theme is condensed into two words – LOOK BACK – inviting the visitors to delve deep into the artworks on display and start reflecting on why they should be looking back or analysing what they see and drawing their conclusions. The artists give each visitor the freedom to interpret their canvasses and the stories they contain.
Both artists explore the outer environment, and their compositions reflect these ongoing pursuits. Although both are individual creators in their own right, several joint projects have given Daugule and Čačka a handful of themes they debate and ‘brainstorm’ together not only in artistic creation but also in associated conversations when they analyse the factors that accelerate or slow their creativity and find a common language to discuss vegetation, ecology and life itself – our greatest teacher and surrender.
Daugule’s method involves layering the colour with special pastes, varnishes and pigments. Her style dates back to the late 1990s and has been affected by both modern and postmodern art. The essence of Daugule’s paintings is chromatic harmony and narrative through figurative plots, along with modernistic colour masses and brushstrokes that she uses to create abstracted dramas.
Čačka’s art is a distinctive blend of painting and printmaking. He uses letterpress to anchor his technical approach to composition whilst documenting concrete and imagined conversations with the people around him. According to the artist, researching and sharing his visual stories gives him a meaningful visual experience he then shares with his viewer, enabling everyone to look back and reflect on their own life in a new, original form.
Latvian painter and art historian Sigita Daugule was born in Rīga in 1971. Today, she is one of the most respected and recognisable contemporary Latvian artists with a solid domestic and international profile.
Daugule’s paintings are featured in significant public collections, such as the Latvian National Museum of Art, the Swedbank Contemporary Art Collection, the Rothko Museum, the Zuzāns Collection and Luciano Benetton’s Imago Mundi. Her work is also held in multiple private collections in Latvia, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Malta, Estonia, the USA, the UK, the Netherlands and beyond. To date, Daugule is the only Latvian artist to have earned the quartier 21 creative scholarship at the Viennese Museum Quarter.
Latvian artist, curator and exhibition producer Māris Čačka was born in Varakļāni in 1976. He has earned broad recognition and acclaim in Latvia and beyond with an original hybrid technique that bridges printmaking and painting.
Čačka’s work is featured in multiple public collections, such as the Latvian National Museum of Art, the EGLE Sanatorium Collection (Lithuania), Madona Local History and Art Museum, Balvi District Museum, Daugavpils Local History and Art Museum, the Cultural History Museum of Latgale in Rēzekne, Ventspils Museum, Talsi Museum and many more as well as in private collections in Latvia and internationally – in Austria, Belarus, Poland, UK, Lithuania, Monaco, Norway, Turkey, Germany and beyond.
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