This time the radio is not playing. Nostalgic for nostalgia Print

Vita Opolskyte (b. 1992) is an up-and-coming painter who studies painting at the Vilnius Academy of Arts and Karel de Grote University College in Belgium. She is an active participant of group exhibitions, artistic projects and workshops. The basic point of reference in Vita Opolskyte’s creative pursuits is the interior. Inspired by the so-called Alice in Wonderland syndrome, which is characterised by distortions of perception of the size and distance of visible objects, the painter combines different scales of the represented interior objects (pieces of furniture, rugs, windows, doors and pictures), directions of perspective and vantage points. In this way, visually misleading, alogical and irrational spaces are created, in which fragments of real interiors and surrealistic elements are combined, customary and strange objects lie around, and small figures of children and animals appear as if from old photographs. Using decorative flattened forms, a calm rhythm of strokes and a subdued range of colours, the painter creates canvases imbued with a kind of mystical cosiness. Her paintings look like something in between an antique doll house and a horror film set, and are filled with a strange secret: one can almost hear the doors squeaking and quiet steps of little feet. Opolskyte’s compositions defy the conventional approach to interior construction and stability, but the actual interior details and meticulously painted ornaments of home textiles lend some materiality and historicity to these spaces. The recognisable nostalgic elements – vintage interior aesthetics, textile patterns of our grandmothers and the stylistics of several decades old photographs – provoke the viewer’s memory and invite him or her to get involved. Thus, the artist emphasises the psychological and emotional suggestion of the represented situations. Opolskyte implies certain details of a literary narrative by visual hints and references in the titles of her works, but there is much more that remains unsaid and can only be presumed and felt. In this way the painter explores the relation between reality and fiction and encourages us to doubt what is true and trust ephemeral visions. Her paintings are a mixture of individual mythology and universal symbols, intimate personal and general cultural experiences.