Evelīna Deičmane's exhibition at Künstlerhaus Bethanien

kim? 

On June 16 at Künstlerhaus Bethanien exhibition space an opening of an exhibition by the Latvian artist Evelīna Deičmane - "Burt Nieks" - took place.

_{Evelīna Deičmane working on the
exhibition. Photo: Ayoung Kim}

Künstlerhaus Bethanien exhibition space is located on Kottbusser Strasse 10, Berlin. "Burt Nieks" is on view from June 17 to July 10. Exhibition features Deičmane's latest works - drawings and sound installations inspired by a village and lake Burtnieki. The word in the exhibition title is split into two parts that have their own meanings. ‘Burt’ here means to bewitch or to enchant and ‘nieks’ here means easy, effortless.

Drawing No 1 says: In ancient time lakes flew around, looking for a place to land. Also the people of current Lake Burtnieks valley saw a lake flying as a dark cloud. It roared and howled. The day became dark as night. Petrified that it will fall down on their heads, people lamented and screamed because they did not know its name. Then they went to the sorcerer and pleaded him to talk the lake away. The sorcerer just said “man burt nieks” (to bewitch is easy for me), and it fell down right away. This is how the lake got its name.

Evelīna Deičmane is a grantee of KIM? Contemporary Art Centre. Artist’s residence at Künstlerhaus Bethanien is supported by the State Culture Capital Foundation of Latvia and VKN (Department of Visual Communication of the Art Academy of Latvia).

On May 29 the philosopher Jānis Taurens and Vassily Voronov, his imaginary friend, the translator from Russian, discussed Deičmane's then future exhibition. The dialogue was performed as a supplementing material for "Burt Nieks". You can download a pdf file here.

More information about the cooperation between kim? and Künstlerhaus Bethanien is available on our Residences' section.