Jānis Avotiņš

Jānis Avotiņš is one of the most internationally renowned Latvian artists. His painting provides a foundation for our collective history and the visual heritage of our recent past. The artist addresses the subject of memory, often employing photographs from state and private archives as well as illustrations from press articles, which enables him to visually capture the intangible matter of bygone times. In his paintings, Avotiņš reduces drawing and colour, modelling spaces and figures with tonally nuanced colour layers. With painterly techniques, the artist seemingly covers over long-ago events with a smoky veil, leaving only a quiet, foggy reflection of the earlier tension of life. 

In the painting “Untitled [A Church],” the main motif is Cologne Cathedral. The unclear outlines of the Gothic structure stimulate reflections on the unusual fate of this church – the many centuries it stood unfinished, its rebirth and transformation into one of the symbols of a united Germany in the 19th century, and its miraculous survival of Allied air raids during the Second World War which destroyed much of Cologne. The fragility of the Gothic architecture and its striving for spiritual form are also sensitively interpreted by Avotiņš, while the ambiguous silhouettes of what are possibly human heads appearing from the depths open the door to mystical speculation.   

Untitled [A Church]. 2019–2020.