For Art Rotterdam 2025, Drifts presents selected works by two Lithuanian artists – Morta Jonynaitė (b. 1995) and Vytenis Burokas (b. 1990) – both artists are interested in the interplay of personal and collective memory, and the ways of creating surroundings for togetherness and communication. Their works are in search of splintered traces of cultural influences and weave collective and personal experiences into subtle time-faded memory landscapes.
In her works, Morta Jonynaitė articulates the fragility of memory by combining intimate and very often painful personal experiences with collective memory. Hand weaving and knotting become a way to tell the intimate stories and build the spaces where relationships between different experiences and participants are interconnected. For Art Rotterdam 2025, M. Jonynaitė presents her newest work Messages from the Sky (2025) where painful miscommunication is resolved through the signs of life on Earth. In times of cultural clashes, connecting through nature offers a possible starting point for dialogue. Though Lithuanian is considered one of the oldest languages, its written form was only structured relatively recently, so people once communicated through various pictograms – a sun, an adder, a twig, a rooster, ancient runes, and pretzels from the future. As the Earth speaks to the sky, we find each other – here, now, and everywhere.
Vytenis Burokas presents the series of drawings the Uncertainty Gardens - the inner landscapes with splintered traces of cultural influences which bridge the gap between language and image. Each Burokas’ work is a preparatory sketch for the next one, and a stain in one drawing can become a facial feature or a life line in the palm of another. In his latest research, V. Burokas merges his artistic practice with gardening, bridging the gap between a remote homestead and city life. Through an ethnological exploration of local history, cosmogonic gossip, and the legends that shape places and rural communities, he uncovers deeper cultural narratives. For him, art is a form of contemporary myth-making – an inquiry into storytelling, community, and the hands-on practice of gardening.
Morta Jonynaitė (b. 1995 in Vilnius, Lithuania, where she currently lives and works) graduated from Gerrit Rietveld Academie (NL), TxT (text, theory, textile) department in 2020. Recent exhibitions include Light Rain with Big Drops at Drifts gallery, Vilnius (2024, solo), Dryads of Cosquer at La Traverse, Marseille, France (2024), Breathing through the eyes at L’Atlas Gallery, Paris (2023); Innocence Becomes Sharks at InTheCloset Gallery, Vilnius (2023, solo); Hold Me Tender, at Tallinn Art Hall Lasnamäe Pavilion, Tallin (2023); Shuttle and Twill at Anastazija and Antanas Tamošaitis gallery Židinys, Vilnius (2023); JCDecaux Award 2022: Waves of Opportunity, Artists’ Association Gallery, Vilnius (2022); FITE – Le Festival International des Textiles Extraordinaires, Clermont-Ferrand, France (2022), Square Root at UMI gallery, Vilnius (2022, solo), Bias Cut at Marcinkonys Station Gallery, Marcinkonys, Lithuania (2021, solo).
Vytenis Burokas (b. 1990 in Vilnius, Lithuania, where he currently lives and works) has completed BA, MA, and art pedagogy studies in Contemporary Sculpture at the Vilnius Academy of Arts. Between 2013 and 2014, he took part in the Rupert educational programme. The artist’s works have been displayed in both group and personal exhibitions, including Linings at Drifts gallery, Vilnius (2023, solo), Tracing the Outlines of Ukrainian History: Louder, Radvila Palace Museum of Art, Vilnius (2022), The Order of The Spur: These Boots Are Made for Walking, apiece, Vilnius (2022, solo); Growing Out? Growing Up? Contemporary Art Collecting in the Baltics, Zuzeum, Riga (2022), Avoidance, Futura, Prague (2021), Wanderings of Draught, Editorial, Vilnius (2020, solo), The Sea Monster, The Bear, lítost, Prague (2020), Sanatorium, Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius (2019), Play within the Walls of Academy, MOCAK, Krakow (2018).
Drifts' participation in the fair is financed by the Lithuanian Council for Culture and Vilnius City Municipality.