Poster Artists and Their Output: From Interwar Latvia to Exile in the West

• In Event: Baltic Art and Artists on the Move

Abstract

The Art Academy of Latvia poster collection, with more than 4,000 items, was discovered as recently as 2021. It is part of art-historical materials gathered since 1961 for the present Academy Information Centre. This poster collection is among the largest in Latvia, second only to the National Library of Latvia. While the Soviet period is most represented, an impressive part consists of interwar independence-time posters mainly by graphic artists. Many of them fled the returning Soviet occupation in late 1944 to establish themselves in the West. Among well-known modernists were the versatile Niklāvs Strunke (1894–1966) whose early posters show radical avant-garde impulses; his later works emerged in Sweden and Italy. Also, Sigismunds Vidbergs (1890–1970) is famous for his exquisite female images created both at home and later in the USA. Less familiar are graphic artists Eduards Dzenis (1907–1999) or Alfrēds Švedrēvics (1887–1979) whose main output were typical Art Deco posters. Dzenis received the gold medal at the Paris International Exposition (1937) for his poster Harvest Festival but later in Canada created graphic design for Latvian song festivals in exile. Švedrēvics ended up as far as Chile (1950) to join its art life with some success. The changed conditions affected all artists in terms of kinds of art, its content and style. To what extent and how the interwar poster traits persisted in their later works is the aim of this paper to outline.

Short Bio

Stella Pelše (b. 1972) received PhD in art history from the Art academy of Latvia for the study “History of Latvian Art Theory: Definitions of Art in the Context of the Prevailing Ideas of the Time (1900–1940)” (2004, published in 2007). She works at the Institute of Art History since 1993. Research interests: art theory, art history, art criticism, aesthetics, contemporary art. Numerous publications in scholarly journals, collected articles, catalogues, albums, etc. Contributor to the books Latvijas mākslas vēsture (Art History of Latvia, Riga, 2003), Deviņdesmitie. Laikmetīgā māksla Latvijā=The Nineties. Contemporary Art in Latvia (Riga, 2010), Reinterpreting the Past: Traditionalist Artistic Trends in Central and Eastern Europe of the 1920s and 1930s (Warsaw, 2010), Art History and Visual Studies in Europe: Transnational Discourses and National Frameworks (Leiden & Boston, 2012), vol. 1 of Latvia and Latvians (Riga, 2018), State Construction and Art in East Central Europe, 1918–2018 (Routledge, 2022), etc. One of the principal authors and translator in the multi-volume project Art History of Latvia launched in 2013 (vol. 4 – 2014; vol. 5 – 2016; vol. 3 – 2019; vol. 1 – 2024).

Author

• Stella Pelše, Art Academy of Latvia Institute of Art History