“DermArs” guild exhibition of artistic leather objects "Living in Art Forms"

The artistic objects by Jūratė Armonavičiūtė, Danutė Gajauskienė, Lolita Grabauskienė, Gražina Kuprevičienė, Virginija Ligeikienė, Rasa Mačiulienė, Relita Miele, Algimantas Šlapikė, Ramutė Toliušytė in this exhibition reveal the possibilities and diversity of leather materials and techniques, as well as a range of artists' styles, ideas and artistic interpretations. Sometimes, experimental works with unexpected results are a real surprise even to the artists themselves. This is all the more so because of the advent of new technologies and a variety of tools, a wider range of leather applications appear. The rest depends on experience, courage and unlimited imagination of the creator.

Creation is life, equally life can be interpreted as creation. The title "Living in Art Forms" means common points of view as regards creation, the surrounding world and the events that inevitably pass through everyone, are experienced deep in the heart and take on an individual associative artistic expression through a form that can only be grasped by fantasy and personal experience. 

Leather art has a long history but first studies of leather art in Lithuania started only in 1959 at the Kaunas Art School. The course of training professional specialists in the art of leather is provided nowadays at the Faculty of Arts and Education of the Kaunas College, the Department of the Academy of Fine Arts. In prior years, however, several generations of artists studied the art of leather at the Estonian State University (now the Tallinn Academy of Fine Arts).

Recently, plastic properties of leather have attracted artists of other professions, who had discovered and exploited the potential of leather materials in their own way. In order to unite the artists working in this field, an informal group of Kaunas artists "DermArs" (Latin: Leather Art) was formed in 1998 on the initiative of the members of the Kaunas Section of Leather Art at the Lithuanian Artists' Union. The group has actively participated in exhibition activities for 26 years now, aiming to support and popularise this unique art movement, to share experience and show the works of the art of leather to the public.  

Curator – Lolita Grabauskienė
Coordinator – Violeta Karmalavičienė
Graphic designer – Jonas Vaikšnoras