The Rooster Gallery kindly invites you to the solo exhibition Happiness of Artificial Daisies by the painter Sandra Strēle, presenting her newest works. The exhibition at the Tech Arts / Rupert space (Vaidilutės St. 79, Vilnius) will run until November 10. The opening of the exhibition will take place on October 30, at 7 p.m.

The exhibition “Happiness of Artificial Daisies” invites us to evaluate the presence of everyday ignorance and random events, which we most likely do not even think about or even notice. Until we realize that we have taken part in a game, the outcome of which is unknown and depends not only on us but on many other multipliers. The central image of the exhibition is a daisy flower, which is associated with the childhood game of “loves me, loves me not”. The player arrives at the answer to their question by plucking off each petal one by one and, of course, remains as uncertain as before the question was posed. And time in the paintings and between them seems frozen and eternal at the same time.

In tennis, the ball flies from one side to the other in a parabolic trajectory. Until some player’s mistake or random luck.

People swam back and forth along the pool paths, separated only by strings of plastic balls, politely obeying the traffic rules. Traffic jams did not form even if one of the calm swimmers changed the direction of movement in an uncontrolled and inappropriate manner. Someone saw it anyway and wrote it down. It wasn’t me this time.

I was playing tennis while someone else was counting the points.

Meanwhile, some others were lazily swimming and had no idea of their emergence. They swam in the dark.

There was a red ladder near us. It was difficult to feel its actual size, observing it through the thickets. It was also not clear where it led. But the way up seemed tempting.

The foundations of the house had started to wobble some time ago. Battling wild plants and creepers, it was still livable. As faithful guardians, the garden gnomes continued to fulfill the task given to them.

The story of the painting was lighter than air. Someone in the distance tried to record it in units of measurement but ended up with another tennis ball hit.

I saw your feet. Each finger was on its own.

Text by Sandra Strēle

Sandra Strēle (b. 1991) is a young Latvian painter. In 2016, she graduated with an MA in painting from the Art Academy of Latvia, where she also earned her PhD in 2024. She also studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. A recipient of scholarships of the Boris and Ināra Teterev Foundation (2012), SEB Bank (2016), and Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation (2019, 2021), and a winner of the Brederl von Sengbusch Art Prize (2014). A winner (2019) and finalist (2017, 2018) of the Young Painter Prize competition of the Baltic States. Since 2013, she has been taking part in group exhibitions, workshops and residencies in Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, France, Germany and elsewhere, and held several solo shows in Latvia and Lithuania. Her works are held in the collections of the Noewe Foundation and the Lithuanian National Museum of Art.