On Friday, November 22, at 16:00, the exhibition “Sensory Imagination” will open at the Liepāja Music, Art, and Design High School Gallery (Alejas street 18). The exhibition will showcase virtual and augmented reality artworks, art installations, and results from workshops conducted during the media art and technology festival UPDATE. The exhibition will be open from November 25 to December 6 on weekdays from 8:00 to 19:00.
The exhibition will feature four virtual reality works:
- Jekaterina Jevdokimova’s “I (Don’t) Remember” – an interpretation of the artist’s childhood memories from the late 90s and early 2000s.
- Kaspars Lēvalds’ “Mist” – based on the 1919 Latvian War of Independence in Liepāja after World War I.
- Elīna Dreimane’s “Lost in the Mist” – exploring Latvian power sites described in traditions, folklore, and stories.
- Olga Barbina’s “Pneuma” – experimenting with human breath as a means of navigation in a virtual reality environment.
As part of the exhibition, ten new augmented reality works will be launched on the mobile application ART+ (https://artplus.app). The augmented reality artworks will be viewable in various locations in the city of Liepāja. The works reflect on cultural heritage, contemporary world issues, the climate crisis, and pollution, experimenting with technologies, as well as expressing personal experiences and reflections on mental health through art. The works will be visible on Liepāja’s beach, Seaside Park, Karosta, and other city locations. To view the works, a smartphone or tablet with GPS and internet connection is required, the ART+ application must be downloaded or updated, and visitors need to go to the designated location of the artwork. Currently, 50 augmented reality artworks are already on display in Liepāja.
The exhibition will also feature two international artists who participated in artist residencies organized by the foundation “Foundation Liepāja 2027” from September to October this year. Spanish artist Carlos Munnoz will present his social platform experiment and installation “Deficiencies of Utopia”, while Ukrainian artist Iryna Loskot will showcase a series of works titled “Invitations” that explore the self-destructive and self-renewing nature of our planet.
The exhibition will display the results of the annual media art and technology festival UPDATE workshops – an interactive sound installation created during the workshop “Become an Antenna” led by Tata Frenkel, a guide on how to be an artist in a world without digital technologies, developed during the workshop “OFFLINE/OFF-GRID” led by Vytautas Michelkevičius, and an interactive work combining motion capture suits and photogrammetry, created during the workshop “Experimental Motion Capture” led by Oleksandr Sirous.
Exhibition Opening: Friday, November 22, at 16:00.
Exhibition Open: November 25 to December 6, weekdays from 8:00 to 19:00.
Exhibition Website:www.updatefestival.lv
Contact: Maija Demitere (maija.demitere@gmail.com, +371 29948430).
The exhibition “Sensory Imagination” is part of the UPDATE festival, organized by the Liepāja-based media artist association ASTE (https://aste.gallery), RTU Liepāja Academy’s Art Research Laboratory (MPLab, https://mplab.lv), and the association ART+ (https://artplus.app). ASTE’s activities in 2024 are supported by the State Culture Capital Foundation (VKKF) for professional non-governmental cultural organizations. UPDATE is realized with the support of Liepāja City Culture Department, VKKF, and RTU Liepāja Academy. The event is implemented with the co-funding of the foundation “Foundation Liepāja 2027” and the European Union’s “Creative Europe” program project “CreArt 3.0 #STRINGING_TOGETHER.”
