. . . I love to draw old faces.

Wrinkled all over like old maps, tired, lonely, questioning, forgotten and still – so alive.

There are so many tired, ruined out faces around me. All society in its fleshiness is so old, so pathetic and so…used. And with every second, every moment we all became a little bit old, a little bit used. By every moment we all end a bit. Slowly or faster but we all end.

In the centre of my works there is a portrait. In art, portrait has always been not only a picture of a personality, but a whole vision, a character of whole society and its time. Through my works I’m not trying to show individual portraits of old people that I’ve met, I want to show the portrait of all society – tired, weak, confused, lonely, lost and sick.

It is funny about old people… because just at that moment when it seems that someone has lived so long, has learned for so long, maybe even has understood how to live – mass society throws him out. Because mass society doesn’t like to watch the OLD – the OLD remind them of that unpleasant truth that we all have tried so hard to hide with all the anti aging creams, masks, cosmetic surgeries and implants.  We don’t search for the company of old people, because they are not beautiful. Not because they wouldn’t be wise – some are wise, but because of the fear of that awareness that no one can escape it. That we all are getting old. That’s why everybody wants the young ones. Because it is like life full of promise of never-ending youth.

It is not pleasant to look in the faces of old people because it is like a mirror, like an inescapable prophesy that one day it is all going to end, that we are only timely.  I have made the portraits almost in the size of real human sizes, so the person, who looks at them could identify themselves with what is shown in the work, could look into the eyes of the portrait. This eye contact, the moment of getting to know the eyes of the work is very important for me. Because actually those eyes are empty, all there is is an empty breathing space of paper for the viewer’s imagination. That they would be able to see themselves there. Because the truth is, that he is one of the people that I’m showing, he is part of this society, part of that world what I am trying to show through my works.

Education
BA in Printmaking, Academy of Arts, Riga, Latvia [2001-2005]
Janis Rozentals Art School [1997-2001]

2006
Art of Contemporary Latvia, Kirkwood College, Cedar Rapids, Iowa
Art of Contemporary Latvia, Arts Iowa City, Iowa

2004
“Real” Riga, Latvia
“Florentine group” Gallery of Academic Arts, Riga, Latvia