Split Print

Ara Radvilė (b. 1995) – a visual artist based in Vilnius, Lithuania. At the age of nine she skipped school for the first time in her life and began her very own exploration of stars and colours. Eventually, that led to the discovery of painting as a way of understanding herself and the relative reality around her. Radvilė graduated from Šiauliai Art School in 2013, and enrolled into the national Vilnius Art Academy where she completed both her graduate and post-graduate studies in scenography. Her work has been exhibited in over a dozen exhibitions. In her practice, Radvilė utilises various different mediums, such as painting, photography, collage and installation. Her latest work focuses on the search of different spiritual states through a yet unrecognised and, thus far, unlabelled pain. It seeks to transform the pain into a concrete, material, and vibrant shape. The process of creation for her is a form of therapy, a ritual, an opening up, and the following act of cleansing. Large canvases, vivid hues, layers of paint, and free-spirited strokes serve to create images of breakthrough, of freedom, of an intangible force. The force which, she believes, primarily stems from her spirit. The spirit of the eternal child, the unrelenting explorer lead by the sky and his heart. It is this spirit which draws the attention of her brushes and lenses. Her painting and photography often feature motives of mother, child, stars, heart, or blossoms. Such seemingly primitive images are firmly planted and grown in the fertile soil of vivid colours and layers.