Emilija Škarnulytė: Riparia (2023), still. Film, 4K, 10’14’’
The Goddess Helix weaves together a multi-year cycle of ongoing artwork by Emilija Škarnulytė to create the first comprehensive survey of this series. Comprising film, sculpture, and holographic imagery, the exhibition highlights three interlaced cinematic installations drawing on the research of Marija Gimbutas (1921-1994), a Lithuanian anthropologist who interpreted the prominence of goddess and serpent motifs in Neolithic art. Within this film series, Škarnulytė embodies a mythic guise—part-human, part-aquatic animal—guiding spectators through the currents of contemporary existence. Two pivotal artworks bookend this series: The Code (2024), a newly commissioned video animation portraying pythons metamorphosing from sigils into a genetic sequence, and Aldona (2013), a poignant homage to the artist's grandmother, who is a foundational pillar of Škarnulytė’s own journey. Exploring themes of adaptation, survival, and myth, these collected stories seek to inspire new means of navigating environmental and social crises amidst growing disillusionment.
Oracles, though elusive, serve as guides throughout the exhibition, offering as many meandering paths as they do answers. The paradoxes they raise seem imaginary, but as the poet Muriel Rukeyzer noted: "the universe is made of stories, not atoms". Politics and science also rest on riddles, and their own lore directly conditions the lived lives of individuals. In turn, Škarnulytė's fabled narratives shadow and reconceive the authority of such "atoms", and calls for us to rediscover ourselves in how we care for, perceive, and exist within the planet, its ecosystems, and the cosmos. The narrative device of her folkloric creatures and guides adeptly performs as a vector, delicately peeling back the myths surrounding the stories we create and rely on to navigate life.
Emilija Škarnulytė (b. 1987), a Lithuanian-born artist and filmmaker, works at the intersection of documentary and speculative fiction. Her video works lead viewers through decommissioned nuclear power plants, forgotten underwater cities, and uncanny natural phenomena. Within these eerie sites, where humanity intersects with the non-human, Škarnulytė delves into the myths and remnants of modernity.
Škarnulytė was awarded the 2023 Ars Fennica Award and the 2019 Future Generation Art Prize. Her recent exhibitions include presentations at the Gwangju Biennale in South Korea (2023), the Helsinki Biennale in Finland (2023), and the Henie Onstad Triennale for Photography and New Media in Norway (2023). Her work has been showcased at prestigious venues such as Tokyo’s Mori Museum, London’s Tate Modern and Serpentine Galleries, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York. Additionally, Škarnulytė co-founded and co-directs the Polar Film Lab, a collective focused on analogue film practice based in Tromsø, Norway.
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The exhibition is supported by Arts and Culture Norway.
The Goddess Helix is curated by Adam Kleinman, Director Kunsthall Trondheim, with Joe Rowley, Program and Production Manager Kunsthall Trondheim.
The Curators would like to thank:
Rosendal Theatre, the Kunsthall team, Annika Svendsen Finne, Mickis Gullstrand, Ida Vie at TYVEN, Nilsson Trelast and Ew Glass & Plast
The artist would like to thank:
Emilija Škarnulytė Studio team, Linas Lapinskas (Architectural Supervision), Vytautas Tinteris (Audiovisual Production) and Erik Vojevodin (Production Coordinator)