This installation is part of the solo exhibition NO LAND, NO EARTH, NO SOIL, NO GROUND by Patricija Gilytė, site-specifically developed for the four museum spaces of the Kasiulis Art Museum, Vilnius, Lithuania.
THE BATTLEFIELD OF GRUNWALD (ŽALGIRIO MŪŠIO LAUKAS) is an installation assembled on a horizontal surface measuring approximately 250 × 320 meters, entirely covered with a layer of spruce needles collected by the artist in Germany. At the center of this needle-covered field lies a 3D-printed geomodel of the battlefield surface, produced using geospatial data of the battlefield.
The needles and the relief are overlaid with a video projection of the same terrain, rendering the battlefield from a subterranean perspective. The projection captures multiple interpretations of the landscape: borders shift, at times aligning with historical reconstructions, at times diverging.
The Battle of Grunwald (Žalgirio mūšis) is one of the most consequential historical events in the histories of Germany, Poland, and Lithuania. Yet the precise location and boundaries of the battlefield remain disputed among historians from different countries. Through the projection and the installation’s material presence, the field appears to seek its own edges, quietly reminding viewers that, despite the battle’s significance to Lithuania, the site itself ultimately lies beyond its borders.
Press release
EN//
Patricija Gilytė is a Lithuanian artist living and working in Germany, who graduated from the Munich Academy of Fine Arts with a degree in sculpture and works in the field of interdisciplinary art.
Her solo exhibition at the Vytautas Kasiulis Museum NO LAND /NO EARTH /NO SOIL /NO GROUND is an immersive exposition, which presents both early video works, the latest installations and geodata based animations, created especially for the museum spaces.
The works are built upon a foundation of Lithuanian cultural heritage, reimagined through visual means and relayed through media. Patricija Gilyte‘s works transform poetry into sculpture while preserving the local poetic “Lithuanian” associations (sand dunes, nuanced green colours: “…and lie face-down in moss”, to quote a poem by Dalia Saukaitytė, popularised by singer-songwriter Vytautas Kernagis) as well as global themes like migration and motifs dictated by climate change (e.g. the migrating forest series, which, over more than a decade, has turned into a series of spruce needle landscapes).
For the first time in Lithuania, the author presents drawings – monochrome maps created with ink and spruce needles. The museum is an empty space for her, open to all directions, which she captures with her artworks and attracts the viewer, encouraging her/him to immerse themself in geographical explorations of the historic Battle of Grunwald, which eventually turns into layers of green forest and green connotations. The only way out is to find the gold cast spruce needle (work series You Are Here, 2021).
(BATTLE-) FIELD OF GRUNWALD. 2021
In Gilytė‘s works, local, national themes intersect with the global. In Lithuanian, the word “žemė“ can refer to either the planet Earth, or land, as in a field or territory, as well as soil as a formative element of our identity these notions emerge in Gilytė‘s works taking multiple forms, evoking various associations. For her, land is much like an archetypal field that localises through artworks. It exists in our imaginations and reflections, in historic memory and literature, it is recorded in maps and ownership documents, and it is the recurring motif of this exhibition. Earlier video works are being weaved into a new fabric with installations and video projections created in situ for the museum space, along with monochrome maps drawn using ink and spruce needles, never before shown in Lithuania.
Text by Dr. Jurgita Ludavičienė, curator of the exhibition
Lithuanian National Museum of Art
Exhibition views: Patricija Gilyte NO LAND /NO EARTH /NO SOIL /NO GROUND, 2021
Lithuanian National Museum of Art / Kasiulis Museum of Art, Vilnius, Lithuania. Photos by Gintarė Grigėnaitė