Indrė Biekšaitė-Vilčinskienė | m i c r o c o s m | 21/02/2023–10/03/2023
Microcosm (Greek: μικρο – small, κόσμος – world order) is a small order in a small universe. We create small universes around us by using many small details and elements. The analogy between microcosm and macrocosm is an idea that has been pondered since antiquity and flourished in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, juxtaposing the worlds of the individual and the universe. For the author, this analogy implies a view that assumes a structural similarity between the human being and the cosmos. Humans were thought to be a miniature representation of the universe, and the human being was seen as a small-scale model of the universe in all its diversity and contradictions.
Indrė Biekšaitė-Vilčinskienė asks the question, what happens when we bring the small, individual world of the artist into the contemporary 21st century universe, where she weaves a handmade classical tapestry, using a specific, extremely meticulous and slow 16th century weaving technique, with the strict requirements and compositional elements that were once necessary? What does a tapestry look like today, depicting a modern man in his environment instead of hunting scenes?
The works Microcosm (2023) and Shield pl.007 (2021) in the exhibition create a contemporary network of connections between the domestic life of the artist and the historical context. In Microcosm, which took the artist over 800 hours to make, she presents a small personal order, as if zooming in on the everyday life of a person sitting in a room, while Shield pl.007 makes the viewer to take a step back and see a wider universe.
In the world of images and tactile experience constructed by the artist, the parts of the microchips disintegrate, begin to move in a chaotic and at the same time highly purposeful way, creating another separate microcosm – a filter through which we see and experience the world. Indrė shows a version of the world she is creating, full of surprises and contradictions, in which she combines different historical periods of humanity with traces of the past and glimpses of a vision of the future.
Opening of the exhibition: 21st of February (Tuesday) at 6 PM
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Indrė Biekšaitė-Vilčinskienė is a contemporary artist whose work explores collective memory, identity and transience. Her work combines two elements that are difficult to reconcile: traditional textiles, which require time and patience, and modern plots, portraits and abstractions, which reflect fast-paced lifestyles, consumer culture, narcissism, the influence of the digital, and the activities of social networks.
She holds a BA and MA from the Vilnius Academy of Arts. Since 2021 she is a member of the Lithuanian Artists’ Association.
