Artist statement

For some, making art means researching. For my lately it is about sometimes finding myself in front of something that I was not searching for.

Each piece of art has its own special formula. Some of its components are constant for centuries, becoming eternal values. Others are directly dependent on the personality of the artist and the place and time where the concrete piece of art is created. They serve as the real testimony of history, embodiment of progressive movement of a creative mind. For my art is a moral and spiritual obligation that cuts across all manner of pretense and speaks directly to the soul.

I am making work about memory. It is not as an exorcism of the past, but rather as, more or less, an honest point to begin an external dialogue. Above all else, it is about leaving a mark that I exist: I was here. I was hungry. I was poor. I was defeated. I was happy. I was sad. I was in love. I was afraid. I was hopeful. I had an idea and I had a purpose and that is why I am making my works.

The installation that I am shoved in the Herbert Sanders Gallery is titled ¨Blue Piglets of Hope¨. I have seen pigs as long as I have been here on the Earth. I know what a pig is, or so I thought. I saw pigs at my grandmother's farm in Latvia as a child. (I have forgotten that I saw blue pigs!) Science allows us to grasp many facts about pigs. As an artist I learned much about anatomy, shape, line, sounds and so forth jet once I have done all that analysis, I still can ask, what is a pig?

I represent my piglets accurately. Because of the clear respect I have for them and their high importance in Homo sapiens' life and history.

I try to understand, to educate myself and the viewer through my findings, even though I don't really believe in seeking and I don't believe in findings.

Maris Grosbahs

March 20, 2002

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