Born in 1976. Initially, Juozas Laivys was more interested in sports and physics (in 1982 – 1990, he attended Rietavas Sports School, and in 1991 – 1994, Šiauliai school of physics Fotonas), later he chose studies in transport economy at the Vilnius Gediminas Technical University (1994 – 1995). In 1995 – 2001, he moved to studying sculpture at the Vilnius Academy of Fine Arts where he received MA. In 2004, the artist went for a postgraduate course at the Ecole National des Beaux-Arts de Lyon 1983-1989 in Lyon (France). Laivys has been participating in exhibitions and symposia since 1995. Some of his works are owned by the Music and Art Library in Vilnius, also by private collectors.

Solo Exhibitions and Projects:

2004

Gallery „Arka“, Vilnius

2002

Art in Time and Space (Menas laike ir erdvėje), action, Vilnius Chamber Music Fund, Vilnius

1997

Students Gallery „Padvalas“, Vilnius

1996

Running on the Nickel-Plated Water of the Vilnelė River (Bėgimas ant nikeliuoto Vilnelės vandens), action, Vilnius

1995

That was Art (Tai buvo menas), performance, Vilnius Academy of Fine Arts, Vilnius

Group Exhibitions: 2003

Festival Virus – 8 (Virusas – 8), Šiauliai (Lithuania)

2 Show: Young Art from Latvia and Lithuania, Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius

2001

International Art Symposium Different Lanscape (Kitoks peizažas, presented work Natural Sea-Salt), Palanga (Lithuania)

2000

Contemporary Art Exhibition on Billboards (presented work History), Vilnius and Kaunas (Lithuania)

1999

Art Symposium Blue-Red (Mėlyna-raudona), Plungė (Lithuania)

1998

Video Festival Eis (presented film Chemical Food), Latako 2, Vilnius

Creative Credo of Juozas Laivys:

The starting point of my artistic work is an action in present time. The possibility to act is an undisputable fact of the present. Since we exist here, at the point full of evidence from the past, and the existence in the future has not still been proven, the possibility to form events now is the essential act, which can summarize the issues I am addressing in my work. Concentrated pleasure with the present moment, referring to the criteria of minimalist conceptualism, allows one to speak about a creative practice cleared from narcotic substances, mental disability or fake creative suffering. Falsehood in any form must be ignored. This is my basic moral position. Artwork for me is an object in space, which confirms an authentic fact, witnesses an event or a specific incident. An action from the past may be directly reflected in a specific object or it can be only implied. In my work, I do not try to humiliate or harm anyone; instead, I suggest enjoying one’s ability to notice and carry out certain changes.


Juozas Laivys Presents His Works:

In 1998, I swallowed a metal pellet of 0,5 cm size in order to exhibit it in the “gallery” of my stomach. I have documented the fact of installation by an X-ray photo of my stomach. I have shown the pellet in an exhibition, and described it as follows: ”This pellet has been exhibited in the stomach of J. L.”

During the symposium in Palanga organised by the Lithuanian Artists’ Association in 2002 I vaporised 1 l of seawater and obtained a certain amount of salt, which I have exhibited under the title: “Sea salt remaining after having vaporised 1 l of seawater”.

On 10 – 11 May 2003, the obligatory referendum over the membership of Lithuania in the EU took place. I participated in it, thus demonstrating my civil activity, but I pocketed my voting-paper, which offered the two choices: “Yes” and “No”. That is how my opinion and the possibility to vote remained with me. I have demonstrated this work in the exhibition 2 Show in the following way: the visual part consisted of the framed authentic voting-paper and the title: „A Citizen’s Voice“.

In 2003, I went to the Venice Biennial to see the exhibition. After buying a ticket and realising that the aim was within my reach, I decided against going in. I brought the unused and unmarked ticket home, and I exhibited it in a show as an evidence of this fact.

In 2003, I made a series of works focusing on the tools, which had been used to perform certain acts, for instance: „The Shaft of a Hammer Broken by another Hammer, 2003“.

Since 2000, I have been making a series of works directly related to the people forming the circle of my acquaintances. To my mind, the fact that the surnames or some other characteristics of these people might not be recognisable in other contexts should not reduce the authentic value of the works. With this series, I intend to return the portrait genre to the field of artistic expression. By demonstrating a certain relationship with people who live now, I am searching for a dialogue with the present time. An example: „An Original Hair of Kęstutis Kuizinas, the Director of Vilnius Contemporary Art Centre, 2004“.

I have made a series of works emphasising, in one way or the other, a secret lurking in some event, which has happened to a specific work in the past. These are peculiar events, the existence and meaning of which may be proven only by performing a certain act in the present time. In such works, I do not try to explain everything or to reveal things entirely. The revelation of a secret, total cognition and total satisfaction of curiosity makes existence and, equally, works of art uninteresting. For example, „Disposable Camera with a Film not Fully Exposed“.

In 2001, I walked 312 km, thus seeking to demonstrate that a physical body can be a means of transport even in the time of highly developed technologies. In order to provide this act with a certain material expression, I walked along a railway and stopped after each kilometre to photograph the signposts. The object, made for the exhibition, was a photo album as an evidence of the trip on foot.

In 2003 – 2008, I have promised to calculate the titles for all my solo shows considering the location of the venue where they would be taking place. The calculation will be based on the following formula: The title of the exhibition is the difference in footsteps between the venue and the nearest maternity home, and between the venue and the nearest funeral home.

The titles of my shows that have already taken place:

2004 Footsteps in Šiauliai Art Gallery
849 Footsteps in Gallery „Arka“, Vilnius
4822 Footsteps in Klaipėda Art Exhibition Hall

[By Juozas Laivys]

Description of Juozas Laivys’s Works:

The art of Juozas Laivys is a consistent and continuous generation of a series of objects, by which the artist is recording the flow of everyday life without interfering too much. Strongly influenced by various strategies of minimalist conceptualism he is exploring local processes of perceiving reality; he visualises the universally used phenomena by demonstrating them at their most obvious and therefore never visible angle. The objects of Juozas Laivys most often consist of minimally important things: he avoids representations and demonstrative propositions; he does not concentrate them into “great” political statements, but provides a microscopic archaeology of a specific thing. This archaeological exploration is inseparable from the artist’s personality, his subjective understanding of the patterns of behaviour, observation, consumption and the acceptance of new experience that are characteristic to everyone, or are never performed, but easy to realise. Due to such subjectivity and a purposefully simplified expression of the above-mentioned exploration, all works by Juozas Laivys acquire their specific shape only when the story of their conception is verbalised in a shorter or more concise manner.

Ūla Tornau, 2004

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Personal exhibitions and projects:

2006

- Project – improvisations of the name PARODŲ RŪMAI (Exhibition Centre), Klaipėda, Lithuania

- Animated Film “Fenas” (Fan), Contemporary Art Centre TV, Lithuania

Group exhibitions:

2006

- Ultima ratio, International Project “Art Today”, Kaunas, Lithuania

- Aakey, Contemporary Art Centre, Tours, France

- Saviobjektai (Self- Objects),Exhibition of Young Lithuanian Artists, the Radvilai Palace, Vilnius, Lithuania

- International Nordic Festival for Contemporary Art “Momentum”, Moss, Norway

- Savišvieta (Self-education), Electric light installations, Artima gallery, Vilnius, Lithuania

- Observation Strategies, Klaipėda Cultural Communication Centre, Klaipėda, Lithuania

- Exhibition of Young Lithuanian-German Sculptors “Buterbrod” (Bread and Butter), Vilnius, Lithuania; Stutgart,Germany

- Invasion, Exhibition of Contemporary Lithuanian Artists, Dortmund, Germany

- Europart, Public Space Project, Vienna, Austria

- Gallery on a motorway “Vilnius-Kaunas”, Lithuania

2005

- NCCI, Exhibition of Young Lithuanian Artists, Moscow, Russia

- BMW, 9th International Baltic triennale, Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius, Lithuania

- Baltic biennale 33 ½ , London Contemporary Art Institute, London, UK

- Pilot-2, International Art Forum, London, UK

- Lion biennale “Randez-vouz”, Lion, France