Mažvilė Rudė exhibition

We invite you to discover traces of experience, entropy, and continuity in Mažvilė Rudė's exhibition "Physically Embodied Stories: Aged Books".

Time is usually considered something from which a painting must be protected. In the dominant culture, preference is given to what is new and flawless, and signs left by time are rarely looked back upon. The author chooses a different path – she allows her works to age. In specially selected places, pigments fade, metals become covered in patina, and cracks in the varnish deepen. Her work explores the flow of time and the laws of entropy – a constant tension between decay and continuity, in which the entire spectrum of intermediate states is revealed.

The author creates using mixed media, employing acrylics, cracking mediums, oxidizing paints, and collage elements – from old book pages and cut-up canvases to metals and natural elements. This is how multi-layered abstractions are born – "physically embodied stories" characterized by rich texture and depth of color.

The axis of the exhibition is books marked by time. Each book carries two stories within itself. One is printed on its pages, the other is inscribed in its time-weathered body. It is a worn cover, a stranger's note in the margin, stains on yellowed paper. We will not find these second stories in any print runs – they are unique.

In the works, one can see a parallel between a book and a person, which is naturally ingrained in our language: we try to "read" each other, we are like "open" or "closed" books. It is often expected of a person that time and lived experience should not mark them. However, in both scars and laugh lines, one can see not damage, but dignified experience. To read the story of each piece, we invite you to come closer.

Exhibition opening on September 6 at 3:00 PM.