Ieva Kraule-Kūna at Latvian National Museum of Art

Artist: Ieva Kraule-Kūna

Exhibition title: Hot Babas

Venue: Latvian National Museum of Art, Creative Studio of the ARSENĀLS Exhibition Hall, Riga, Latvia

Date: December 13, 2019 – February 23, 2020

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Latvian National Museum of Art

Three old babas, old ugly babas.

One fat as bulging porridge – bulging porridge that children reluctantly eat at the breakfast. Dumpy bumpy – so large that birches part, so large that birds leave in autumn as there is no room left when fat baba sits in forest amid mushrooms.

Second one is hidding behind most slender of birches. Hey bony! Why do you loiter in dark corners, why are you hidding in shadows? Join us boys, join us boys in bars, you hot baba in those leather boots, in those black sexy gloves!

EH! EW!

You so ugly in light, you old baba, bony baba. Why do you scare our children?

Third baba, hairy baba, you beast! You work as a bull and howl as a wolf for your truth, you beast! Shoo!

Run back to forestwithyour hairy legs, there is your place.With bears and wolfs, you demon, you hobgoblin!

But suddenly a nice man in black dress appears and he gives a smile. Come babas, all three babas in this cosy nook. Warm in the light of the kindling.

WARM
WARMER
HOT
HOT
HOOOOT

Burn you old hags, burn! Bur in the flames of hell! Hot flames of Church will tear your flesh like your hot ideas tore morals of our daughters, the order we have established, the order of God! Burn, burn you babas!

Babas are burning, flesh is burning, but ideas stay. Dreams of babas don’t burn. In the heat they rise as dough and bake yummy pretzels, yummy latitudinarian pretzels. Come, our daugters and sons, ones that have escaped the men in black dresses, ones not soaked in their rivers. Come! Eat pretzels of our babas,l eat their flesh and feed your souls!

Ieva Kraule-Kūna (1987) was born in Latvia. She studied at the Sandberg Instituut in Amsterdam. Artist mostly produces sculptural objects using various materials (ceramics, stone, metal, etc.), accompanying them with short stories, where absurd adventures of fictive characters mix with skewed interpretations of historical facts. In her works, Ieva Kraule-Kūna refers to Soviet architecture, artisanship and fetishism.

Her most significant solo and duo exhibitions include: The person you are trying to reach is not available together with Aidan Koch (2016, J. Hester Gallery, New York), Qu’est-ce que ça peut faire tout ça together with Kaspars Groševs (2015, Shanaynay, Paris), Nobody Dances Like That Anymore (2014, Gallery 427, Riga), …if all you told was turned to gold (2014, Vita Kuben Gallery, Umeå), 11 out of 10 (2013, kim? Contemporary Art Center, Riga). Most significant group exhibitions: Paris Internationale (2015, Paris), XII Baltic Triennial (2015, CAC, Vilnius), Le fragole del Baltico (2015, CareOf, Milan), Lily’s Pool (2015, Art In General, New York), Vortex (2014, Project Space Garage, Moscow).

Ieva Kraule-Kūna, Hot Babas, 2019-2020, exhibition view, Latvian National Museum of Art in Riga, Creative Studio, ARSENĀLS Exhibition Hall, Riga