Maretta Staprāne Bārlova's Exhibition “Laima. Raimonds: Family Portraits of Happiness”

At Rainis and Aspazija's summer house in Jūrmala, the exhibition “LAIMA. RAIMONDS: Family Portraits of Happiness,” by Maretta Staprāne Bārlova, is on view.

The starting point of the exhibition is the question: what does happiness look like? A person's portrait is formed not only by outward appearance, but also by what usually remains invisible: memories, personally meaningful music, favorite colors and places, a smile, and brain activity. LAIMA connects Raimonds Staprāns' artistic legacy with the perspective of the next generation, bringing the principles characteristic of his painting, color, light, space, and composition, into a new artistic process.

The exhibition centers on 27 members of the Staprāns family from four generations. Each has their own life experience, idea of happiness, and way of experiencing it. During the creation of the works, the participants answered questions about happiness, listened to music that was meaningful to them, and reflected on moments of joy, peace, and closeness. At the same time, their brain's electrical activity was recorded with electroencephalography, or EEG.

The EEG data are not used to diagnose emotions or to scientifically measure happiness. The readings of alpha, beta, theta, and gamma activity are transformed into parameters that influence the intensity of the pattern, the visual structure, the level of detail, and sharpness. This is part of the artistic method developed by the author, not a clinical interpretation of EEG data. The result is not a psychological profile or a scientific illustration, but a work of art in which personal experience takes visual form. The exhibition also features visualizations of the participants' brain activity data, including that of Raimonds Staprāns.