Regensburg, 2020
Laser cut pigment print
14 x 21 inches
Remnants: A Solo Exhibition By Krista Svalbonas
February 1 - May 14, 2023
Peeler Art Center, University Gallery (upper level)
Krista Svalbonas has a longstanding interest in architecture and ideas of home. She is fascinated by the language of spatial relationships and the psychological effects of architectural form and structure upon the human condition. Svalbonas is ethnically Latvian/Lithuanian whose parents spent many years after the end of World War II in displaced-person camps in Germany before they were allowed to emigrate to the United States. Their childhood memories were of temporary structures, appropriated from other (often military) uses to house tens of thousands of postwar refugees. Svalbonas’s connection to this history has made her acutely aware of the impact of politics on architecture, and in turn on a people’s daily lived experience. Her work explores architecture’s relationship to cultural identity, social hierarchy, and psychological space. Svalbonas works in a variety of media, including photography, painting, and installation. Within her practice she is often looking at the range of the camera-generated image, and its combination with other media such as silkscreen, painting, collage, as well as its integration with technology including CNC routing and drone photography. Svalbonas’s avid interest lies at the intersections of media where these technical investigations serve social, political, and cultural explorations.