Exhibition "Daugava" in Kalnciema Quarter

From October 25 to November 18, 2017,  in Kalnciema Quarter
gallery will be seen the kinetic object "Daugava" (1960-1970) of the artist Valdis Celms. 

Artist's active involvement in the development of urban and interiors projects made him one of the leading practitioners of Latvian art and design. The creative manifestations of the versatile artist include both design objects, poster graphics, manipulations with the photo and collage, visual aesthetic representations of the Latvian Song Festival, as well as published impressive theoretical studies on sign culture. Valdis Celms is also known to many as the designer of the letters of the border mark "Riga".

"In the cinematic work Daugava, created in 1974, science interacts with art and the socio-political context of the time, combining color, form and movement. The work includes associative images from Latvian cultural history and cyclical nature events. The perception screen is divided into vertical bands as in any hydrotechnical building. In each band, the principle of the gradual transition of color shades from light to dark shade and back was widely used in Latvian ethnographic fabrics. This transition takes place in motion, and we see a kind of pulsation in two directions - up and down,  as the color bands expanding and shrinking as a result of an optical illusion. The purpose of the work is to recall the endless contradiction and, at the same time, the search for harmony between Human as a natural part on the one hand and Human as a artificial environment's technology and culture creator, on the other, in the middle of the 20th century of the Latvian SSR in the real political and cultural space. Work calls for the preservation of national self-confidence and identity, not to lose it in so-called brand newness and progress, "says Valdis Celms.

The exhibition is open every day, except Sunday, from. 10:00 to 18:00.

Riga, Kalnciema street 35

Free entrance

Organized by Kalnciema Quarter in cooperation with the Center of Contemporary Art in Latvia and the Wildlife and Environmental Film Productions.