An exhibition of the legend of unconventional art Kazimiera Zimblytė at Pranas Domšaitis Gallery of the LNMA
Exhibition opening on Friday, 8 November, at 6 pm, 2024
Pranas Domšaitis Gallery of the LNMA in Klaipėda invites to the opening of the exhibition by Kazimiera (Kazė) Zimblytė (1933–1999), Kazė Zimblytė‘s Abstractions: Between Moods and the World. This summer the exhibition was on at Pamario Gallery in Juodkrantė, receiving attention by art professionals and visitors. Zimblytė’s artwork represents characteristic parlance of the avant-garde art, in this case, a marriage of painting with the techniques of collage and assemblage to render the artist’s moods in images. The exhibition in Klaipėda will be on through 30 March.
The idiom of the female avant-garde artist
Zimblytė is one of the pioneers of abstract painting in Lithuania, and her current exhibition offers the viewers a closer familiarity with her unorthodox avant-garde approach in visual art. The artist’s creative ideas gave rise to her distinct idiom of expression. Zimblytė used a diversity of structural solutions for her compositions, dominated by either dark or light colour. She used all kinds of paints, working in oils, watercolour, gouache on canvas, paper or cardboard, and married painting with collage and assemblage, gluing pieces of torn canvas, paper, hide, sheets of foil to the painted surface.
According to the curator Nijolė Nevčesauskienė, the sharp contrasts in her solutions open the artist’s unique world of visions, poised somewhere between psychological states of loneliness on the one hand, and reality with its material dimensions on the other. The artist wanted to introduce the dimension of space as well by either darkening or brightening colour around the edges of paintings or gluing sheets of glittery or lacquer-coated paper positioned in the corners to expand the visual space. Paper on canvas functions as a fragile membrane, as butterfly wings that perish over time, destroyed by dust or physical impact.
Beyond the conventional art
Born in the village of Briedžiūnai, the future artist studied textile at Vilnius Art Institute. Later she was employed by Vilnius Arts/Design Central Workshops, where she designed textiles and fabrics. From 1959, she embarked on a period of intense participation in group exhibitions, all-Lithuania events, exhibitions by female artists, applied arts events. Her colourful, decorative designs were exhibited abroad as well, in Poland, Russia, Japan, Germany, France and elsewhere. However, during soviet years, Zimblytė’s abstractions were banned from all official visual arts events. At the time, no public venues in Lithuania accepted her solo exhibitions, either. Like other avant-garde artists, Linas Katinas, Vincas Kisarauskas and others, she gave her solo events at private or semi-private locations, for example, Judita and Vytautas Šeriai salon, Vilnius’ cinema theatres, the building of the Lithuanian Writers’ Union.
The rise of the independence movement Sąjūdis and the reestablished independence of Lithuania was the most opportune time for the artist. In 1988, she gave her first official solo exhibition at the main exhibition venue at the time in Vilnius, called ‘Exhibition Palace’. Lietuvos Aidas Gallery hosted several events by the artist.
The exhibition Abstractions: Between Moods and the World at the Pranas Domšaitis Gallery of the LNMA includes also photographic images by Zimblytė, showing her unique avant-garde performances. They were staged by the artist in the late 1960s in Vilnius, in the private garden of Vladas Vildžiūnas and Marija Ladigaitė-Vildžiūnienė in Jeruzalė region.
Curator Nijolė Nevčesauskienė
Coordinator Aurelija Malinauskaitė
Exhibition architect Ieva Glumac
Designers: Loreta Uzdraitė, Domantas Pigulevičius
33 Liepu st, LT-92145, Klaipėda, Lithuania
++370 46 410 412
domsaicio.galerija@lndm.lt
