EXHIBITION OF LEONORA KUISIENĖ ARTISTIC BOOKBINDING “A TRIBUTE TO THE MUSES”

M. K. Čiurlionis National Museum of Art, V. Putvinskio str. 55, Kaunas

This is the fourth exhibition of the bookbinder Leonora Kuisienė, which main theme is about inspiration and the inspirers – the muses. The exhibition presents books, in one or another way related to the divine inspiration: from the first act of creation – the beginning of human beings, to the manifestations of creative inspiration by one of the Lithuanian geniuses – M. K. Čiurlionis: the bound notes of the composer, and letters to his wife Sofia. However, the main leitmotif of the exhibition is the nine-month-bound books of the Greek Muses, born of the Nine Nights of Mnemosyne and Zeus.

Leonora Kuisienė is a bookbinder from Kaunas, who cherishes the fading art of bookbinding for today. Her creativity is best described by three things: professionalism, experiment and neo-romantic aesthetics. Fostering the tradition of bookbinding culture, the artist is also building new paths for the future of this branch. The main field of activity is the conceptual experimental book – as an object, as an idea, where the most important thing is the expression of thought, its fixation and interpretations, born in the process, involving the audience. Nevertheless, the traditional mastery is equally important to the artist. Despite the fact that the artist is moved away from a traditional book, she maintains a high level of technical subtleties of bookbinding and is perfectly mastering nearly all techniques of bookbinding and artistic leatherwork: wrinkling, clipping, tinting, burning, gilding; as well as the openwork, leather sculptures, relief, dimensional skin formation techniques, traditional methods of bookbinding, and their various interpretations. The artist does not use pressed clichés for imprints – she makes everything with a chisel. According to her worldview, the bookbinding professional claims to be born in the nineteenth century, therefore the style of her chosen techniques and the style of her works is a breath of neo-romanticism in the hurry of today’s world. L. Kuisienė has participated in several collective exhibitions and has already organized three solo exhibitions of artistic bookbinding.

The exhibition will run until the 5th of January, 2020