Arūnė Tornau. Dead Books
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Organised by
Vilniaus Graphic Art Centre
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Exhibition partly funded by
Lithuanian Council for Culture, Lithuanian Artists’ Association
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Media partners
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On January 21 – February 16, 2025, an exhibition of works by Arūnė Tornau titled Dead Books will be will be on display at Vilnius Graphic Art Centre’s “Kairė-dešinė gallery”. The opening will be held on January 21, 2025, at 6pm.
The installation displayed in the gallery addresses cultural memory, past time, the search for values, and their loss. The author offers her artistic interpretation of ways of preserving and making sense of books doomed to be destroyed. The installation is made of old books that people do not want to read or own anymore. The artist wraps the books in clean white cloth, sews them up in the manner of mummifying, and ‘buries’ them. The installation is complemented by black pigment-covered painting works that resemble a fire scene or a place of ritual burning.
According to Tornau, the idea behind the artistic reflection on the ‘death’ of the book was prompted by the diminishing significance and changing function of books, particularly among adolescents and young adults. ‘People do not read anymore and literature does not shape worldviews. Signs of devaluation of books and their slow death are evident. I often stumble upon discarded books by the dumpster. At best, they are left on the unwanted publications shelves in bookstores or in the outdoor ‘little free libraries’. I find it wrong, even blasphemous. There were periods in history when books were destroyed as seedbeds of hostile ideology. And vice versa – in repressive conditions, banned books played a prominent role in the formation of people’s outlook. A book could determine an individual’s destiny and encouraged thinking,’ claims the author of the exhibition.
Arūnė Tornau (b. 1956) is a painter and installation artist. She studied at the Vilnius State Art Institute in 1974–1979. Since 1990 Tornau has been a member of the Lithuanian Artists’ Association, and in 2009–2016 chaired the Painting section of LAA. She takes part in exhibitions in Lithuania and abroad, with about 40 solo shows to date. Her works are featured in the collections of the Lithuanian National Museum of Art, MO museum, Šiauliai ‘Aušra’ Museum, LAA Art Fund, Museum of the Lithuanian Bank, and Luciano Benetton’s collection. In 2021 Tornau was awarded the Golden Badge of the LAA. In 2023, an album dedicated to the artist’s work titled The End is the Beginning (artseria) was published.
* The exhibition is part of the programme of the 90th anniversary of the Lithuanian Artists’ Association.
** The expibition is part of the SUMENĖK cultural route:
February 1 and February 15 at 1pm.: guided tours of the exhibition with the author.
February 8 at 1pm: talk by the literary scholar and children’s literature critic Eglė Baliutavičiūtė The Death of the Book: When Does It Come and Can We Do Something About It?