News
2023-04-06
New artwork in the collection – installation "Spring is in the Air" by Severija Inčirauskaitė-Kriaunevičienė
The Lewben Art Foundation has expanded its collection with a new piece – Severija Inčirauskaitė-Kriaunevičienė's installation "Spring is in the Air" (2022). Severija Inčirauskaitė-Kriaunevičienė (b. 1977) is one of the most prominent artists of contemporary Lithuanian textiles, she is also a well-known creator in the international art arena.
The artist has graduated from textile studies and obtained a VAA Art Licentiate degree. The original thinking and the author's technique of creating artworks brought Inčirauskaitė-Kriaunevičienė wide international recognition of her work. She has received many awards (in 2020, the Lithuanian Government’s Prize for Culture and Arts was awarded to her for an important contribution to the field of Lithuanian culture and art), and is constantly invited to participate in international contemporary art exhibitions and present her art pieces at international conferences. Her creations have been acquired by the most important museums of art and design. Inčirauskaitė-Kriaunevičienė has exhibited her artistic work alongside such well-known names as Andy Warhol, Joseph Boys, Jeff Koons, Erwin Wurm, Marina Abromovich, Damien Hirst, Jenny Holzer, Banksy and others.
"Spring Is In The Air" (2022)
Metal fuel tanks, cotton. Drilling, cross-stitch.
48 cm x 280 cm x 6 cm
In the spring of 2022, not only the flowers and the leaves of the trees shot forth, but also a whole bouquet of war buds: hot, conventional, hybrid, economic, information, energy war...
The ecological threat of the Earth’s self-destruction, which had already established itself as a major global problem, along with the Coronavirus themes, withered away in a single day of hot war in the information fields. Criticism of the overconsumption of resources was suddenly replaced by panic about the scarcity of energy raw materials and the prospect of a less comfortable everyday life. It is only the sword of Damocles in the form of the nuclear catastrophe that still echoes the narrative of ecological risks.
The collection "Spring is in the Air" (2022) is composed of old metal fuel tanks. Black-burning warehouses of military industry and petroleum products; Ukraine that has turned into a junkyard of rusted military equipment; the graveyard of metal and people from the "Azovstal" steel plant; the daily fluctuating graphs of the oil and electricity stock and (un)employment markets – nothing seems more stable than the rhythm of nature, which is constantly changing, but which still maintains a seasonality. (author Tomas Kriaunevičius)
