CERAMIC LABORATORY

9th International Ceramic Art Symposium

For the ninth time running, Daugavpils Fortress was captured by ceramicists – for an entire fortnight, symposium participants from seven countries united forces in a single front, making ceramic artworks and experimenting with different firing techniques, inspired by the exceptional atmosphere of Daugavpils Fortress and sheltered from the heat by the cooling walls of the Rothko Centre.

At the symposium, the participants entered a new, unfamiliar environment that some may have even found exotic. Here, they did laboratory-style experiments – shared experiences, observed their colleagues at work, tested new materials and tried unusual firings. Some preferred more controlled experiments, producing sample pieces from the available range of materials, whilst others put caution aside and surrendered fully to the irresistible pull of the unpredictable. Taken together, they filled the symposium timeframe with new emotions, ideas and insights that may very well bring unexpected twists and turns to the artists’ individual creative journeys.

This exhibition is an output of a fortnight’s work that, once the show is over, will be incorporated into the Rothko Centre ceramics collection, strengthening Latvia’s broadest assemblage of ceramics and reaffirming the symbolic status of Daugavpils as the ceramic capital of the region.

This year, the international symposium “Ceramic Laboratory” is part of the Latvia, Lithuania and Belarus cross-border cooperation project “Cross-Border Loyalty Programme for Culture and Tourism” (project acronym – “Loyal to Culture and Tourism”, No. ENI-LLB-1-021).

The symposium is supported by the State Culture Capital Foundation.

Aivars Baranovskis

Symposium participants:

Sunbin Lim (KR)

Weronika Surma (PL)

Joanna Opalska-Brzecka (PL)

Mingda Du (CN)

Pille Kaleviste (EE)

Solveiga Gutautė (LT)

Rūta Šipalytė (LT)

Hanna Miadzvedzeva (BY)

Katerina Geiduka (BY/ LV)

Ilona Abdulajeva (LV)

Nellija Dzalba (LV)

Kaspars Geiduks (LV)

Una Gura (LV)

Lilija Zeiļa (LV)