Mindaugas Navakas, denying the established rules and seeking an alternative, expands self-legitimised possibilities. The artist’s vital world outlook is close to the rebellious youth movement of 1968. In the 1980’s, his associatively abstract granite sculptures, post-modernistic photomontages of imaginary artworks in the city and his first projects in public spaces audaciously broke the concept of decorative sculpture established at that time. Today, in the time of the consumer cult, the artist creating huge granite and steel sculptures for his own pleasure, not on commission, makes a challenge to the new life standards.

In his work Navakas innovatively uses the rapidly renewing post-industrial technologies. They expand the field of artistic expression, materialise the premonitions of modern tensions in steel and silicon objects, sculptures on the water, images of dried plants, run-over cats and dogs, sound installations, slide projections of small visually suggestive items (crumpled paper scraps, corks) and fragments of live nature.

For the artist the interaction of a three-dimensional object and its environment has a conceptual importance. The granite sculptures of ever increasing size acquire the shape of a shifting and opening-up object, and return to their original state – a granite rock becomes a constructional support for a sculptural object or the surface of a polished sculpture-to-be. Materialising his early photomontages, Navakas invades the urban space. He supports architectural objects of different stylistics by rusty steel arms, sticks an aggressive hook into a Stalinist façade, places a reconstructed silage tank in a park alley. The neo-brutal volume of his sculptures acquires the dimensions of the craving for power, irony, cruelty, weakness and fragility, all blended in human experience.

Elona Lubyte, 2004

CV

MINDAUGAS NAVAKAS

Born

1952 in Kaunas, Lithuania.

Lives and works in Vilnius, Lithuania.

Since 1990 teaches at the Vilnius Art Academy.

Studies

1970-1977State Art Institute (Vilnius), Departments of Architecture and Sculpture.

Awards

1995 – Herder Prize (Alfred Toepfer Stiftung F. V. S. Hamburg and Vienna University).

1999 – National Prize for Culture and Art of the Lithuanian Republic.

2004 – Baltic Assembly Prize

Selected Solo Shows

1986 Vilnius notebook I. Association of Architects, Vilnius

1987 Sculpture, drawings. Artists‘ Palace, Vilnius

1991 Sculpture, drawings, artist‘s books. Exibition Palace, Klaipėda, Lithuania

1993 Matinee Litauen. Park Rittergut, Birkhof, Germany

Mindaugas Navakas in the Contemporary Art Centre. CAC, Vilnius

1994 Good Steel. Gallery Šiaurės Atenai, Vilnius

1996 Waltzing Matilda. Gallery M 6, Riga

Various. Gallery Jutempus, Vilnius

1999 Lithuanian National Pavilion. 48th Venice Biennial, Venice (together with Eglė Rakauskaitė)

The Hare and Fox. Gallery Academia, Vilnius

150W. Gallery Jutempus, Vilnius

2000 Swan. Gallery Noass, Riga

2001 Landmarks. Breanas Kulturhuset, Sweden (together with Pal Suensson)

2002 On the Walls. Gallery O11, Vilnius

Cats. Gallery O11, Vilnius

2003 Rustling. Gallery O11, Vilnius

2004. Waltzing Matilda. Gallery Nemo, Eckernförde, Germany

Petasites and more. Antanas Mončys museum, Palanga

2005Girlianda. Galllery Intro, Vilnius

2006/R/works. Latvian National museum of Art, Riga

2006 /R-O/ works. Contemporay Sculpture museum, Oronsk (Poland)

2007 Decoaration. Instaliation in the public space, Vilnius

Selected Group Shows

1980, 1984, 1988 (prize) Baltic Sculpture Quadreannial, Riga

1984 Jaroševaitė, Kuzma, Mazūras, Navakas, Urbanavičius, Vildžiūnas. Small Plastics, Drawings. Lithuanian Art Museum, Vilnius; 1985 – Sculptors‘ House, Riga; Art Fund Exibition Hall, Tallinn

1987 Concrete sculptures by Mindaugas Navakas, photography by Alvydas Lukys and Gintautas Trimakas, University courtyard, Vilnius

1988 Signs of Man. Sculpture, Drawings, Photography. Exibition Palace, Klaipėda,

Lithuania

Tradition of Folk Art in Modern Lithuanian Art of the 20th Century. CAC, Vilnius

1989 Small Scalesculpture from Lithuania. City Gallery, Salzburg, Austria

1990 Concrete Sculpture. Artists‘ Palace Park, Vilnius

International Art Exhibition Radar. Kotka, Finland

1992 Ostsee Biennale 92. Das steinerne Licht. Rostock, Germany

Concrete Sculpture. Artists‘ Palace Park, Vilnius

1993 Sculpture and Photography. Tallinn Art Hall, Tallinn

Mare balticum.13th Stckholm Art Fair, Sollentuna, Sweden

Lidz-svars. Like-vekt. Equi-librium. Baltic-Nordic Contemporary Art Exibition.

Exhibition Hall, Riga

Between Sculpture and Object – in Lithuanian. CAC, Vilnius

Vilnius/Oslo. UKS, Oslo

Rauma Biennale Balticum 94. Rauma Art Museum, Rauma, Finland

Bread and Salt. CAC, Vilnius; 1995 – Edinburgh College of Art, 1996 – Cornerhouse

Gallery, Manchester, Great Britain

D. Jankauskas, D. Narkevičius, M. Navakas, V.Umbrasas. Gallery of the Association

of Polish Architects, Warsaw

1995 Europe: Creation – Recreation. Műczarnock, Budapest

Port of Art. Kotka, Finland

Kwangju Biennale 95. Kwangju, Korea

Prospects. Saltsjöbaden, Stockholm

Creations, art in the church environment. Flamslat kirka, Skaraborg, Sweden

1996 Change of Rules. Tools. Södertälje Art Hall, Södertälje EP, Sweden

Personal Time. Zachęta Gallery of Contemporary Art, Warsaw; Central Exibition

Hall Manezh, St. Petersburg

1997 Quiet Modernism in Lithuania. 1962-1982. CAC, Vilnius

The Great Düsseldorf Art Exhibition. Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf, Germany

1998 It Takes 10 Minutes To Be On Time. Gallery Academia, Vilnius

Twilight. CAC, Vilnius

1999 Lithuanian Art. 1989-1999: The Ten Years. CAC, Vilnius

2000 Later, You will come in. Gallery of Stuttgart Art Academy, Stuttgart, Germany

Baltic Security. Arlanda airport, Stockholm

Walls of Nato. CAC, Vilnius

Pusan Bienale. Pusan Olympic Park, Korea

2001 Four Decades in the Garden. Vladas VildžiūnasGallery, Vilnius

Self Esteem. Lithuanian Art 01. CAC, Vilnius

Balts: Soviet Nonconformist and Modern Art. Zimmerly Art Museum, New Jersey,

USA

2002 Choice: Lithuanian History, Culture and Art. European Council, Strasbourg, France

On Production. M. Žilinskas Art Gallery, Kaunas, Lithuania

2003 Sculpture on the River Neris. Vilnius

2004 European Space. International sculpture Quadrienalle, Ryga

Selected Symposiums

1977, 1978, 1980, 1981, 1982, 1989, 1990 Symposium of Granite Sculpture in Smiltynė, Klaipėda, Lithuania

1995 Stone Symposium, Kankaampää, Finland

1998 Road of Art. Pori-Yvaskyla highways, Finland

1999 Juodkrantė Symposium of Sculpture. Juodkrantė, Kuršių bay, Lithuania

2001 Symposium of Sculpture. Molėtai, Lithuania

2002 Sculpture zone. Kaunas, Lithuania

2004 Internationl Stone Symposium. Eckernförde, Germany

Internationl Stone Symposium. Jarmala, Latvia

2005 Internationl Stone Symposium. Riga, Latvia

Selected Sculpture in the Public space:

1992 Axis. Eckernförde, Germany

1994 Hook. Meno lyga, Vilnius

1995 For Granite Rock. Kotka, Finland

1997–1998 Reconnaissance. Hellersdorf, Berlin

2000 Shelter. Pusan Olympic Park, Korea

2004-2005. Flags on the Nemunas. Merkynė,

2006 Big Fish Tranoy/Hammaroy,Nordland,Norway

Stage Design

1997 Opera Pär Gynt, composers K. Antanelis and A. Navakas. National Opera and Ballet

Theatre, Vilnius (together with Lars Wellejus)

2000 Opera Bear, composer B. Kutavičius, libreto by A. M. Sluckaitė-Jurašienė. National Opera and Ballet Theatre, Vilnius

Works in Collections

Lithuanian Art Museum, Vilnius

Vilnius University Graphic Arts Cabinet, Vilnius

Museum of Foreign Art, Riga

Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki

Zimmerly Art Museum, New Jersey , USA

Private collections in Lithuania and abroad