Drawing Exhibition “Embodied Thought”

This is the first major survey in Latvia devoted to artistic drawing, offering a chance to explore an ancient graphic technique as an independent form of creative self-expression and the artists whose practice gives drawing a special place.

The exhibition concept is based on the relationship between drawing and thinking, emphasizing drawing’s ability to create an empathetic experience and encouraging viewers to draw closer to the artist’s world of ideas.

The exhibition features 97 artists from different generations, starting with Johann Christoph Brotze and representatives of classical art, continuing with leading figures of contemporary art, and ending with artists born in the 1990s. The broad chronological span, through the personal and fragile technique of drawing, makes it possible to trace the development of Latvian art up to the present day. Today drawing is a highly relevant medium and, despite rapidly advancing digital technologies, many artists still highly value analogue drawing, a direct and tactile means of expression closely linked to materiality, the movement of the hand, and the scale of the body.