Rimantas Milkintas
After six years of successful work AV17 gallery relocated to the central part of the city (Totoriu str. 5) – more spacious premises, allowing it to expand its activity and attract a larger audience.
Rimantas Milkintas, an artist who cooperates with the gallery from the date of its foundation, took part in the opening of the new AV17 premises. This artist is actively working in the art field in Lithuania and abroad from 2003, and has obtained prestigious awards in Lithuania and other countries many times. In 2011 “ARTVILNIUS’11” international contemporary art fair the artist has received an award for sculptural image in the exhibition space. R. Milkintas’s work can be distinguished by its clear aesthetics, resembling the modernist style tradition, elegance of forms and lines, integrity of materials and theme. Guided by the principle that an artist is a reflection of his day, in his work R. Milkintas expresses actualities and ideas of his time.
On the occasion of the opening visitors were invited to see R. Milkintas’s exhibition “Almost Noon”. This exhibition is a conceptual review of the artist’s experience and development of his creative ideas. “Almost Noon” retrospectively presented artist’s legacy by recently created works. The new AV17 gallery premises were filled with artist’s sculptural installations, which author associates with certain words, expressing a specific time and period. The artist used these words during the creative process and showed the spirit of our times, excess of information and fast-paced life, when we are always in a hurry, yet we are always late. In his exhibition works, R. Milkintas used lingual grounds of the past, present and future, which reflected either the stages of creation or the paces of life, common to humanity. Used in the most of presented works, steel became a specific symbol of artistic maturity and stability.
This exhibition also was a symbolic beginning for a new space, new time and period of the AV17 gallery.