On Thursday, February 27, at 18:00, the exhibition 'Horrify Me, Soothe Me, Horrify Me' by Laimdota Malle will be opened at the RSU Anatomy museum. The artist's new exhibition is the result of a six-month creative residency at the Anatomy Museum, during which Laimdota Malle created a visual dialogue with its collection, suggesting reflections on the living and fragile in contrast to the departed and encapsulated.
By not separating humans from nature and the processes of other living beings, the artist seeks metaphors for the dialogue between human and natural anatomy both in form and in the invisible connections of memory and emotions. Exploring body parts reduced to their objects and functions, the new series of works consists of symbolic wax shells and imprints of various bodies that balance between movement and still time, rhythmic repetition and diffusion.
In each of these works, a subjectively perceivable layer is felt – touches given, received, and ceased to be given by some hand, sounds accumulated by the ear's cochlea, countless knots and twists woven and renewed by some encapsulated nervous system, breath that begins and stops in the lungs, fluctuating between fear and comfort. Even after the previous owners have left the bodies, their life continues in a cycle of physical and emotional rejuvenation, where inhabitation, flourishing, and decaying are possible in both grief and tenderness.
The exhibition at the RSU Anatomy Museum is on view until March 29.
About the exhibition artists
Laimdota Malle is a visual artist who works with sculpture, images, sound, and space using various media to create installations through which she explores and questions collective and personal experiences. Laimdota Malle has completed a master's program at Manchester Metropolitan University in the UK and a master's degree at the Latvian Academy of Arts, gaining international recognition for her creative approach and innovative explorations. In 2023, Laimdota Malle was nominated for the Purvīša Prize for the installation 'OOZE'.
Aleksejs Beļeckis is an interdisciplinary artist who works with space and image and organizes exhibitions in various forms. In 2024, Aleksejs created the space for Katrīna Neiburga's exhibition and also curated exhibitions by Andris Eglītis and the Fyodor Golan brand at the Latvian National Museum of Art. He is one of the organizers of the art space Savvaļa and has worked on several exhibitions of Latvian pavilions at the Venice Biennale.
