Rimaldas Viksraitis

Rimaldas Viksraitis (born 1954 in Sunkariai/Lithuania) already received international recognition. In July 2009 the photographer had won the prestigious Discovery Award at the Arles photography festival, having been nominated by Martin Parr, who characterized his work as "slightly insane and wonderfully surreal". Grimaces of the Weary Village is the name of his black-and-white-photography, taken over the past 30 years, displaying the strange beauty of sparse countryside-life. Examples of what there is to see are, a farmer bending over a dead pig with a blowtorch, a chicken perched on his back, or a young girl staring out of a window over the decapitated head of a goat. Welcome to the strange, frightening and darkly humorous world of Rimaldas Viksraitis, a photographer who travels through the benighted villages of his native Lithuania with a camera tied to his bicycle. The motifs that recur in his work are, in no particular order, vodka, breasts, dirt, animal carcasses and inebriated, often semi-naked pensioners. The photographer is also, as Parr has pointed it out, a storyteller, and a director of his own narratives. He can be classified somewhere between staged photography and social reportage.

Major works:
Slaughter (1982–1986); End of Road (1988–1995); Waiting (1988–1998); Nude in a Desolate Farmstead (1991); Meadow at 11a.m. (1995); Burning Mask (1996–1997). This Crazy World (1995–); Pranks of Spring (1996); Grimaces of the Worn-out Village (1998–); Farmsted Dreams (2002–).

One-man exhibitions:
Photography Gallery, Panevėžys, 1994; Photography Gallery, Marijampolė, 1995; 1996; Fujifilm Photo Gallery, Kaunas 1998; Photography Gallery, Klaipėda, 1998; Photography Gallery, Panevėžys, 2000; Grimaces of the Worn-out Village, Vilnius Photo Gallery, Vilnius, 2001; Art Gallery galerija, Šiauliai, 2002.

Group exhibitions:
How Are You?, Prospektas Photo Gallery
Vilnius, 2001; Lithuanian Insight: Photography from 1960to Now, Leinwandhaus Galerie, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, 2002.

Collections:
Lithuanian Union of Art Photographers, Vilnius.

Publications:
Fotografijos, Kaunas: Kauno meno fondas, 2002.

Bibliography
: Atsisveikinant su XX amžiumi, Vilnius, 2000; Lietuvos fotografija: vakar ir šiandien, Vilnius, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003