Eglė Butkutė

In her work, the artist speaks about the disappearance of authenticity and identity as well as the complexity of perceiving oneself as an individual. Her motifs reveal themselves in gym scenes, which the artist, in an effort to free herself of them, has selected from her own personal experience.

‘Recollections about the place where I vaulted, tumbled, and swung on a ring pushed such ideas into my mind. Gyms, full of children: short and tall, chunky and four-eyed, weak and energetic – everyone striving to perform the same tasks. Hanging, climbing, soaring, again hanging, and vaulting. Those now distant spaces and the things I used to do have stayed in my memory to this day. Because of the unrealised tasks, that time gives me no peace, pursuing me as if to remind me that certain norms must be met in life.’

Painter Eglė Butkutė, in her own way, questions those norms: what is normal, and what is no longer normal, combining her personal relationship with the past and the general social atmosphere of that time.

The landscape structure that dominates in the pictures has great meaning for the artist: she reflects on the past, as if by looking at the people milling around, at the very well known places, which are forever changing, they can become some sort of the fiction in her head. ‘My work is characterised by sketchiness; I am seeking to convey a hint of a recollection, a brief moment in time.’

Eglė Butkutė has won the Young Painter prize (in 2014).