VV Foundation is pleased to announce the 2025 program at PAiR Residency. With the new season ahead, PAiR gallery will showcase a dynamic series of new exhibitions. Stay tuned for a more detailed program with creative works by our amazing artists:
Uta Bekaia
June 21 – July 2
Uta Bekaia, “Jāņi”
This June, multidisciplinary artist from Tbilisi, Georgia, Uta Bekaia, will present “Jāņi”, a site-specific performance and installation dedicated to Latvia’s rich Solstice Day traditions. Developed by Uta Bekaia during his stay at the PAiR residency in Pāvilosta, the project will premiere as a live performance on June 21, 2025, followed by an installation, documenting the event. The project will be curated by Daria Kravchuk, an Amsterdam-based curator, museologist and an art journalist. Her curatorial practice focuses on contemporary art, exploring projects which are contextual, socially engaging, and emphasise locality.
During his residency, Uta Bekaia will work closely with local weavers, who will craft textiles to be integrated into the costumes of the performers. Drawing from Latvian folklore and ritualistic traditions, Jāņi will interweave ancestral craftsmanship and contemporary art, creating a deeply immersive experience, honouring the cycle of nature and renewal.
The June 21 performance at PAiR residency will be a dynamic celebration of the solstice, inviting audiences to engage with themes of transformation and cultural memory. The subsequent installation, open from June 27, will serve as a lasting reflection of the performance, showcasing its visual and material remnants.
July 3 – August 6
Amanda Ziemele, “THIS WORLD, and the OTHER WORLDS too.”
The exhibition is part of the Latvian Pavilion exposition “O day and night, but this is wondrous strange… and therefore as a stranger give it welcome” created by Amanda Ziemele (1990) at the 60th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale in 2024.
As the curator Adam Budak says, “this exhibition repositions Amanda Ziemele’s sculptural and painterly work, conceived for the industrial interior of the Venetian Arsenale: from laguna to the coast, the sun’s journey through the irregular surfaces, adored by tender brush strokes and precise gesture of the shape’s moulding. Amanda’s work is an act of both, a doubt and an embrace, while reflecting upon the plurality of today’s world, and its precarity, a reunion of this and the other.”
With this exhibition, PAiR continues its tradition of bringing Latvian artists from Venice Biennale to its gallery, offering a platform to further contextualise Ziemele’s innovative work and make it more accessible to the local audience.
The exhibtion’s public programme will include:
- July 3, 16:00
Curator Adam Budak in conversation with artist Amanda Ziemele
- July 12, 13:00
Lecture given by artist Amanda Ziemele and commissioner of the Latvian pavillion at the Venice Biennial 60th International Art Exhibition Daiga Rudzāte.
Katja Novitskova
August 8 – September 15
Katja Novitskova
Katja Novitskova, an Estonian artist based in Amsterdam and Berlin, explores ecology, image production, and planetary sustainability through her work, often integrating online imagery with physical spaces. At the PAiR residency, her artwork “forever” , made in collaboration with Kareem Lotfy, will enter into dialogue with her video art piece from the VV Foundation collection, resulting in an innovative show curated by Olga Temnikova.
Originally created for Milan’s Haunter Records, “forever” combines a bold text with a black-and-white image of hyenas, playfully emerging from the bushes on the residency’s northern façade to challenge perceptions of fear and the unfamiliar. As part of the exhibition, Novitskova will also visit PAiR with a series of readings, offering deeper insights into her practice.
Aija Zariņa
November 7 – December 31
Aija Zariņa, “Gentle Pendulum”
The Earth is a part of the cosmos. The cosmos evaluates what a person is like as a master of the Earth. The time has come to grow up from an irresponsible and naughty child and take responsibility for our actions. Not to eat from ready-made food from a spoon, but to think more broadly, more independently and accept different perspectives. To grow and transition from a consumer to a creator.
The project “Gentle Pendulum” highlights Aija Zariņa’s creative undertakings in the field of monumental painting. The leading theme in this project is nature, because nature is one of the main creators of living beings. The most important thing is to maintain the human connection with nature, because it restores a person as a natural being. This connection allows us to grow and develop our inner resources. Nature is the place of improvement.
The exhibition, curated by Kristians Fukss, will showcase the result of Aija Zariņa’s work during her PAiR residency, scheduled from September to November of this year.
About VV Foundation
VV Foundation was created in 2018 by art enthusiasts Vitas Liberte, Viļnis Štramas and Jānis Borgs, with the mission of promoting interdisciplinary creativity in contemporary culture and research. The Foundation advances enduring creative partnerships and collaboration throughout the contemporary cultural scene in the Baltic region and between leading international artists, curators, researchers, theorists, gallerists and creative industry professionals. By running the PAiR residency and organising exhibitions, community art projects, educational events and vernacular creativity workshops, the VV Foundation aims to become a leading patron of contemporary culture in the region.
About PAiR
The PAiR residency, founded and managed by VV Foundation, aims to stimulate creative interaction and promote knowledge transfer in the contemporary art world. PAiR is a place for inventive encounters, where artists, researchers and curators can develop their projects in a stimulating, distraction-free environment based on interdisciplinary dialogue. PAiR is located at Ernesta Šneidera laukums 11, Pāvilosta, Latvia.
For further information:
pair.lv/
vvfoundation.org/lv/
