Exhibition Transfiguration by Egils Rozenbergs

RIGA - Prominent Latvian textile artist Egils Rozenbergs’ personal exhibition Transfiguration will be on view in the Cupola Hall of the main building of the Latvian National Museum of Art in Riga (5th floor; Jaņa Rozentāla laukums 1) from 8 June to 26 August 2018.

For artist Egils Rozenbergs, the summer of Latvia’s Centenary began with participation in the exhibition Colour of Gobelins. Contemporary Gobelins from the “Mobilier national” collection in France at the Museum of Decorative Arts and Design, as well as in the 6th Riga International Textile and Fibre Art Triennial Tradition and Innovation at the ARSENĀLS Exhibition Hall. However, the solo exhibition Transfiguration is a project that took several years to create and is site specific for the Cupola Hall of the Latvian National Museum of Art. It is a creative depiction of the symbols and signs typical of the age and the significant transformations of technology and materials.

Using traditional weaving techniques and the classical wall hanging format (300 x 250 cm), Rozenbergs’ objects reveal the possibilities for expression characteristic of the electronic age at the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st century. The artist has turned to until now unused materials and motifs evoking thoughts on what an unusual time we lived in – a time ruled by vinyl records, when the tape recorder era advanced from wide to narrow tapes and when Pink Floyd was all the rage. Then everyone was captivated by videos that provided information on world events and the latest films that was otherwise impossible to obtain in Latvia during the time of stagnation. All these technologies that were current once have quickly become obsolete but materials have remained.

That is why, instead of the natural raw materials of wool and linen, Egils Rozenbergs has begun to work with synthetic materials – video and audio tape, polypropylene and fibres from other materials. At the same time his works reveal the specific properties of these raw materials and their ability to reflect light, which helps to heighten the visual expressiveness. In the compositions of fabrics from decorative fibres, the artist transforms the graphical representations of artificial crystal structures and microcircuits into the features of contemporary style.

Egils Rozenbergs graduated from the Department of Textile Art of the Art Academy of Latvia in 1971 and has taken part in exhibitions in Latvia and abroad from 1969. His works can be found in the Latvian National Museum of Art, Cleveland Museum of Art (USA), the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, the collections of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation and Artists’ Union of Russia (Moscow), ING Bank (Venezuela), the Danish Royal family (Copenhagen) as well as in the Latvian Embassy in London, the Latvian Representation to the UN (New York) and other public institutions.