Simonas Gelminauskis (1968) is a creator of abstract expressionism, who after a break of 23 years came back to the field of art in Lithuania and abroad in 2015. This new creative phase has become especially productive for the artist. In just five years, he has participated in as many as 15 solo and group exhibitions and in 2019, he presented his works at the international art fairs – “Art Shopping” in the Louvre, Paris and “Art Vilnius”.
Creative beginnings – at the studios of famous Lithuanian artists
The painter started his creative career in his early childhood: since 1977 Gelminauskis became involved in the life of different art schools and private studios; since 1989, he began studying pictorial art at the Vilnius Academy of Arts. During this period of 1977-1991, the painter improved his professional skills with the famous de-romanticists Arvydas Šaltenis, Kostas Dereškevičius, and no lesser famous modernist creators - Ričardas Vaitiekūnas, Vladas Karatajus, Mindaugas Šnipas, Audrius Naujokaitis, Vidas Drėgva and Vytautas Pečiukonis. Maybe that is why it is not strange to see in the canvases of Simonas Gelminauskis a de-romantic worldview formed by his teachers, or perhaps by his own personal experience - an unpoetic, sometimes brutal, complex daily life where we can sometimes set eyes on the individual silhouettes of characters hiding morphing stories of life.
Twenty three year long break changes stylistic direction
Gelminauskis's artistic aesthetics, which began with realistic, expressionist strokes depicting recognizable urban objects, have been transformed into an abstract expressionism; a direction that is not based on a particular compositional narrative, but on a colour expression of the plastic art that conveys subconscious emotions. It plays with the viewer's gaze as if every stroke of the painting is visible through a hole in the kaleidoscope. Though looking at S. Gelminauskis's worksan idea may emerge that the author was inspired by the modern art direction predecessors Jack Pollock and Franz Kline, he nevertheless manages to create a strong stylistic identity that distinguishes the artist from the general context of contemporary abstractionists.
Between the emotion, in the plane of impulsive surprise, there open up structures seen somewhere in memories. Symbolic crossroads, ritual phalluses, Christian motives, bamboo groves, blades of grass, looking at which it is possible to smell a fictitious summery scent or feel complex peripeteias of inner states. Canvases of a large format demonstrated at the exhibition, which strengthen the impression of the artistic expression, do not leave anyone indifferent and involve the observer in an inner dialogue with the perceived artwork. Next to them, even the smaller paintings in some places do not fade, but individually bloom as if adding to the intersecting lines painted by the rollers or brushes. They connect with perspective points, creating depth in the plane of the canvas, but the imaginary narrative is really just a mysterious mirage, subjectively changing with each new observer...
“Simonas Gelminauskis is an artist with an interesting attitude towards creative plastics art, who amazes through his passion and determination to achieve his goals without additional stagnant factors. His artistic activities in recent years prove that even after a long creative break, the paths and the market can be open to enter professional peripeteias - all you have to do is to create while believing in yourself and giving to your canvases distinctive artistic senses. The exhibition is as if the crossroads of creation, as in the topic of creations as in the philosophical meaning. And we, the spectators, are at the point of observation, because the painter creates an intrigue and we do not know where to he is going to make his following step,” the curator of the exhibition, Vilma Jankienė says.
The exhibition “Crossroads” will take place from 27 January to 27 February and the celebratory opening event will be held on 31 January, 7 p.m. at the AP Gallery (10 Polocko Street Užupis). There will be a conversation held with the artist during the event. Free entry.
