Considered to be one of the most significant Latvian-American artists to date, Vija Celmins is a visual artist best known for her photo-realistic paintings and drawings of natural environments. Due to her long-held fascination with phenomena such as the ocean, spider webs, star fields, clouded sky and rocks, Vija dedicated both her life and career to depicting such wonders in an unconventional way. This New York City-based painter became renowned in artistic circles mostly due to her ability to create drawings with such fine detail that they seem to be the actual old-school photographies themselves instead just being elaborate copies. In that regard, no one is able to come even close and rival the talented hand Celmins displayed over the years.
Vija Celmins was born on the 25th of October in the year of 1938, in the city of Riga, Latvia’s capital. During the years that eventually proved to be an introduction to the bloodiest conflict in human history, Celmins fled to Germany in her parents’ hands. Not aware of the extreme radicality nazi government was about to install, the young girl and her family were forced to survive the refugee-despising regime. They lived in a United Nations refugee camp in Esslingen am Neckar, Baden-Württemberg, staying there until the end of World War II. During the year of 1948, the Church World Service relocated the family to the United States, at first in New York City, then in Indianapolis. Through this rather unfortunate turn of events, ten-year-old Celmins found herself in a foreign country without knowing more than a few words of English[1]. Forced to face such isolation early on in her life, Vija turned to drawing as a mean of escape from reality. Pushed by her professors down the road of painting, she eventually started attending classes at the prestigious John Herron School of Art in Indianapolis where she blossomed as aa painter. It was during her college days that Celmins started to explore the works of the Italian monotone still-life painter Giorgio Morandi – this pushed her down the road of controlled abstraction. After she earned her BFA in 1962, Vija moved to Venice, Los Angeles, where she lived for the next twenty years, spending most of her time painting or sculpting.
Operating in California during the 1960s, Vija Celmins’ early work was starting to shape itself into a fantastic photorealistic painting practice. At first, she recreated commonplace objects such as TVs, lamps, pencils and erasers, but eventually started painting monochrome reproductions of photographs. Vija mostly focused on war themes in this period of her career, depicting images of conflict such as depictions of handguns and warplanes. During the late 1960s through the 1970s, Celmins completely abandoned traditional painting in order to dedicate herself to graphite pencil, creating highly detailed photorealistic drawings based on photographs of natural elements. Vija started presenting scenes of the moon’s surface, sky, ocean, the insides of shells and closeups of rocks[2]. The incentive guide which Giorgio Morandi provided her was more than obvious as he is widely considered to be the uncrowned king of the pale gray still life. Suddenly, a visit to the New York museum was highlighted by Vija’s desert surface works. As the 1970s were passing by, Celmins also started sculpting a lot more than in earlier periods of her life. She produced numerous series of bronze cast and acrylic painted stones. By 1981, she abandoned the pencil completely and returned to painting, as well as producing a large number of prints.
Now that she was active for over sixty years, observing Celmins’ career as a whole is a new awe-inspiring challenge. She was active in so many fields and mediums, produced countless pieces of art and was a crucial member of artistic circles for decades – for those reasons, analyzing Vija’s career is an almost insurmountable feat. Interestingly, the only consistent aspect of her work was the medium in which she was never active – photography. Never before her was a person who spent so much time exploring and investigating photos without actually utilizing them as Celmins did during her life. And in all probability, there never will be again.
This artist is represented by Kunzt.gallery.
References:
Featured image: Vija Celmins – Untitled, 1999 (detail). 30 × 21 3/4 in. 76.2 × 55.2 cm. Photo courtesy Kavi Gupta Gallery
Other images via tate.org.uk
All images used for illustrative purposes only
Year | Exhibition Title | Gallery/Museum | Solo/Group |
---|---|---|---|
2016 | Frequent Long Walks | Hannah Barry Gallery, London | Group |
2016 | Duchamp to Pop | Norton Simon Museum of Art, Pasadena, CA | Group |
2016 | New Acquisitions | Zane Bennett Contemporary Art, Santa Fe, NM | Group |
2015 | Vija Celmins | Wiener Secession, Vienna | Solo |
2015 | Spaced | Edward Thorp Gallery, New York City, NY | Group |
2015 | Childish Things | Skarstedt, London, London | Group |
2014 | Chapter 1: Listening to Silence and Whispers | Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama Triennale, Japan | Group |
2014 | POP: Pop Art Myths | Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, Spain | Group |
2014 | Vija Celmins | The Latvian National Art Museum, Riga, Latvia | Solo |
2013 | The Distaff Side | The Granery, Sharon, CT | Group |
2013 | The Pop Object: The Still Life Tradition in Pop Art | Acquavella Galleries, New York | Group |
2013 | Out of the Ordinary | Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C. | Group |
2012 | Drawings from Los Angeles in the 1960s and 1970s: The Marmor Collection | Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University, Stanford, CA | Group |
2012 | Regarding Warhol: Sixty Artists, Fifty Years | The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York | Group |
2012 | Explorateurs: Œuvres du Centre national des arts plastiques | Musée de l’abbaye de Sainte-Croix, Les Sables d’Olonne, France | Group |
2012 | Intimate Immensity: The Susan and Larry Marx Collection | Hammer Museum, Los Angeles | Group |
2012 | Printin’ | The Museum of Modern Art, NY | Group |
2012 | Lifelike | Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN | Group |
2012 | Artist Rooms: Vija Celmins | Tate Britain, London | Solo |
2011 | Print by Print: Series from Dürer to Lichtenstein | Baltimore Museum of Art, MD | Group |
2011 | Once Emerging, Now Emerging: Livin’ L.A. | Cirrus Gallery, Los Angeles, CA | Group |
2011 | Pacific Standard Time: Under the Big Black Sun | Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, CA | Group |
2011 | Wander, Labyrinthine Variations | Centre Pompidou-Metz, France | Group |
2011 | Pacific Standard Time: Crosscurrents in LA Painting And Sculpture 1945-1970 | Getty Museum, Los Angeles | Group |
2011 | Pacific Standard Time: State of Mind: New California Art, circa 1970 | Berkeley Museum of Art, CA | Group |
2011 | Globalissimo | 601 Artspace, New York | Group |
2011 | First-Hand Evidence: Vija Celmins, Robert Gober, Brice Marden, Bruce Nauman, Gemini G.E.L. | Joni Moisant Weyl, New York | Group |
2011 | Vija Celmins: Prints and Works on Paper | Senior and Shopmaker Gallery, New York | Solo |
2011 | Wüste Meer und Sterne (Desert, Sea, and Stars) | Ludwig Museum, Cologne | Solo |
2010 | Galaxy & Cosmos | Jason McCoy Inc., New York | Group |
2010 | Water, Jane Voorhees | Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ | Group |
2010 | Painting and Sculpture: Foundation for Contemporary Arts Benefit Exhibition | Lehmann Maupin, New York | Group |
2010 | The Grenfell Press: Thirty Years of Collaboration | Knoedler Project Space, New York | Group |
2010 | Another Green World | Carriage Trade Gallery, New York | Group |
2010 | Vija Celmins: New Paintings, Objects, and Prints | McKee Gallery, New York | Solo |
2009 | Starry Messenger: Galileo’s Vision in 21st Century Art | Louisiana Art & Science Museum, Baton Rouge, LA | Group |
2009 | Artists and the Natural World | McKee Gallery, New York | Group |
2009 | Mark Wallinger curates The Russian Linesman | The Hayward Gallery London | Group |
2009 | Artist Rooms | Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh | Group |
2008 | Artist’s Choice: Vik Muniz, Rebus | Museum of Modern Art, New York | Group |
2008 | Time and Place: Los Angeles 1957-1968 | Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sewden | Group |
2008 | Print Lovers at 30: Celebrating Three Decades of Giving | The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO | Group |
2008 | Sand: Memory, Meaning, and Metaphor | Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, NY | Group |
2008 | Here’s The Thing: The Single Object Still Life | Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, NY | Group |
2008 | Attention to Detail | Flag Art Foundation, New York | Group |
2007 | Under the Starry Sky | Museum Franz Gertsch, Burgdorf, Switzerland | Group |
2007 | The Painting of Modern Life | Hayward Gallery, London | Group |
2007 | The Third Mind | Palais de Tokyo, Paris | Group |
2007 | Early Signs | McKee Gallery, New York | Group |
2006 | A Trace of A Trace of A Trace | Perry Rubenstein Gallery, New York | Group |
2006 | Celmins, Gibbs + Martin | Timothy Taylor Gallery, London | Group |
2006 | Step Into Liquid | Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver, CO | Group |
2006 | Against the Grain: Contemporary Art from the Edward R. Broida Collection | The Museum of Modern Art, New York | Group |
2006 | Selections from the Collection of Edward R. Broida | National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. | Group |
2006 | Vija Celmins: A Drawing Retrospective | Centre Pompidou, Paris | Solo |
2005 | Contemporary Voices, works from the UBS Art Collection | Museum of Modern Art, New York | Group |
2004 | The Not-So-Still Life | San Jose Museum of Art,CA | Group |
2004 | Art by MacArthur Fellows | Carl Solway Gallery, Cincinnati, OH | Group |
2004 | From Here to Eternity | Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, Scotland | Group |
2004 | Off The Wall, Works from the JP Morgan Chase Collection | Bruce Museum, Greenwich, CT | Group |
2004 | Summer Camp | Patricia Faure Gallery, Santa Monica, CA | Group |
2004 | Living Dust | Norwich Gallery, Norwich School of Art and Design, Norfolk, UK | Group |
2004 | Contemporary Masters | Alan Koppel Gallery, Chicago, IL | Group |
2004 | A Very Liquid Heaven | Tang Museum and Art Gallery, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, NY | Group |
2003 | Making an Impression: Printmaking at the Herron School of Art | Herron Gallery, Indianapolis, IN | Group |
2003 | New Prints, Berthot, Celmins, Puryear | McKee Gallery, New York | Group |
2003 | For the Record: Drawing Contemporary Life | Vancouver Art Gallery, Canada | Group |
2003 | Hyperrealismes USA 1965-75 | Musée d’Art Moderne et Contemporain de Strasbourg, France | Group |
2003 | Painting. From Rauschenberg to Murakami, 1964-2003 | Venice Biennale, Museo Correr, Italy | Group |
2003 | Pencil: Drawings from the Collection | The Museum of Modern Art, Queens | Group |
2003 | The Paradise, Vija Celmins | The Douglas Hyde Gallery, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland | Solo |
2003 | Vija Celmins Prints | Susan Sheehan Gallery, New York | Solo |
2003 | Celmins Prints | Herron School of Art, Indianapolis, IN | Solo |
2002 | Women Artists: Their Work and Influence 1950's – 70's | Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco | Group |
2002 | Time to Consider, The Arts Respond to 9.11 | Deutsche Bank Lobby Gallery, New York | Group |
2002 | Painting: a passionate response, Sixteen American artists | The Painting Center, New York | Group |
2002 | Whitney Biennial 2002 | Whitney Museum of American Art, New York | Group |
2002 | From the Observatory | Paula Cooper Gallery, New York | Group |
2002 | Insecta Magnifica | Wave Hill Glyndor Gallery, Bronx, New York | Group |
2002 | Annal Benefit | Art Resources Transfer, New York | Group |
2002 | Tempo | The Museum of Modern Art, New York | Group |
2002 | Biella Print Triennial | Museo del Territorio Biellese, Italy | Group |
2002 | Group Print Exhibition | Richard Levy Gallery, Albuquerque, NM | Group |
2002 | 110 Years: The Permanent Collection of the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth | Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Texas | Group |
2002 | Vija Celmins: Works from The Edward R. Broida Collection | Museum of Fine Arts Houston, TX | Solo |
2002 | The Prints of Vija Celmins | The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York | Solo |
2001 | Centenary Exhibition | The Whitechapel Art Gallery Centenary, London | Group |
2001 | Les années Pop: Cinéma et politique: 1956-1970 | Musée National d’art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris | Group |
2001 | Collaborations with Parkett: 1984 to Now | The Museum of Modern Art, New York | Group |
2001 | What Is a Print? | The Museum of Modern Art, New York | Group |
2001 | Kindly Lent Their Owner, The Private Collection of Steve Martin | Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art, Las Vegas, NV | Group |
2001 | At Sea | Tate Liverpool, England | Group |
2001 | The Inward Eye, Transcendence in Contemporary Art | Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TX | Group |
2001 | Vija Celmins Drawings | Museum fur Gegenwartskunst, Basel, Switzerland | Solo |
2001 | Vija Celmins, New Paintings | McKee Gallery, New York | Solo |
2000 | The Sea & the Sky | Beaver College Art Gallery, Glenside, PA | Group |
2000 | Lost | Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, UK | Group |
2000 | NEW works | McKee Gallery, New York | Group |
2000 | Conceptual Realism | Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery, The University of the Arts, Philadelphia | Group |
2000 | Prints and Multiples | Senior & Shopmaker Gallery, New York | Group |
2000 | Vija Celmins Prints | Cirrus Gallery, Los Angeles | Solo |
1999 | Powder | Aspen Art Museum, CO | Group |
1999 | Flashes: Contemporary Trends, The Cartier Collection | The Exhibition Center of the Centro Cultural de Belem, Portugal | Group |
1999 | Examining Pictures: Exhibiting Paintings | Whitechapel Art Gallery, London | Group |
1999 | La realitat i el desig | La Fundació Joan Miro, Barcelona | Group |
1999 | Cosmos: From Romanticism to the Avant-garde | The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal | Group |
1999 | Regarding Beauty: A View of the Late Twentieth Century | Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington | Group |
1998 | The Edward R. Broida Collection | Orlando Museum of Art, FL | Group |
1998 | Terra Incognita | Neues Museum Weserburg, Bremen, Germany | Group |
1998 | Photo Image: Printmaking 60s to 90s | Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA | Group |
1998 | Speed: Visions of an Accelerated Age | Whitechapel Art Gallery, London | Group |
1998 | Sea Change | The Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, NY | Group |
1997 | Scene of the Crime | The Armand Hammer Museum, UCLA, Los Angeles | Group |
1997 | Views from Abroad: European Perspectives on American Art 2 | Museum fur Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main, Germany | Group |
1997 | Whitney Biennial 1997 | Whitney Museum of American Art, New York | Group |
1997 | Heaven: Public View, Private View | P.S. 1, New York | Group |
1997 | Spiders and Webs | Barbara Krakow Gallery, Boston, MA | Group |
1996 | Group Exhibition | Daniel Weinberg Gallery, San Francisco | Group |
1996 | About Photography | Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Japan | Group |
1996 | Views From Abroad: European Perspectives on American Art 2 | Whitney Museum of American Art, New York | Group |
1996 | Night Sky Paintings & Drawings 1994-1996 | McKee Gallery, New York | Solo |
1995 | About Place: Recent Art of the Americas | Art Institute of Chicago, IL | Group |
1995 | Contemporary Drawing: Exploring the Territory | Aspen Art Museum, Colorado. | Group |
1995 | American Art Today: Night Paintings | The Art Museum, Florida International University,Miami | Group |
1995 | American Academy Invitational Exhibition of Painting and Sculpture | American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York | Group |
1995 | Vija Celmins | Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, Paris | Solo |
1994 | Contemporary Master Prints, Fletcher | Priest Gallery, Worcester, MA | Group |
1994 | Love in the Ruins: Art and the Inspiration of L.A. | Long Beach Museum of Art, CA | Group |
1994 | The World of Tomorrow | Thomas Solomon’s Garage, Los Angeles | Group |
1994 | Facts and Figures: Selections from the Lannan Foundation Collection | Lannan Foundation, Los Angeles. | Group |
1994 | Vija Celmins – Prints, 1970-1992 | Cirrus Gallery, Los Angeles | Solo |
1993 | Les Environs | Pamela Auchincloss Gallery, New York | Group |
1993 | About Nature | Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art, OH | Group |
1993 | Azur | Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, Paris | Group |
1993 | Landscape, Myth vs. Reality | Barbara Mathes Gallery, New York | Group |
1993 | On Paper | Asher Faure Gallery, Los Angeles | Group |
1993 | Vija Celmins – Printed Matter | University Gallery, Fine Arts Center, University of Massachusetts, Amherst | Solo |
1992 | Selections from the Broida Collection | Palm Beach Community College Museum of Art, FL | Group |
1992 | 44th Annual Academy – Institute Purchase Exhibition | American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, New York | Group |
1992 | Elemental Nature | Midtown Payson Gallery, New York | Group |
1992 | Vija Celmins Retrospective | Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia | Solo |
1992 | Vija Celmins, New Paintings | McKee Gallery, New York | Solo |
1991 | The Times, The Chronicle, and The Observer | Kent Fine Art, New York | Group |
1991 | The Contemporary Drawing: Existence Passage and the Dream | Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, MA | Group |
1991 | A Bestiary | Paula Cooper, New York | Group |
1991 | Women Artists | Miramar Gallery, Sarasota, FL | Group |
1991 | For 25 Years: Gemini G.E.L. | The Museum of Modern Art, New York | Group |
1990 | The Persistence of Vision | Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York | Group |
1990 | Home | Asher-Faure Gallery, West Hollywood, CA | Group |
1990 | Vija Celmins: Drawings and Prints | P*ence Gallery, Santa Monica, CA | Solo |
1989 | Making Their Mark: Women Artists Move into the Mainstream | Cincinnati Art Museum, OH | Group |
1989 | L.A. Pop in the Sixties | Newport Harbor Art Museum, Newport Beach, CA | Group |
1989 | Boundaries: A Traditional of Drawing at Herron School of Art | Herron School of Art Gallery, Indiana University, Indianapolis | Group |
1989 | Multiples | Marc Richards Gallery, Los Angeles | Group |
1989 | Contemporary Prints And Drawings from the Mellon Bank Collection | Allegheny College, Meadville, PA | Group |
1988 | Welcome Back: Works by Contemporary Artists from Indiana | Herron Gallery, Indianapolis Center for Contemporary Art, IN | Group |
1988 | Of Another Nature | Loughelton Gallery, New York | Group |
1988 | Vija Celmins, New Paintings | David McKee Gallery, New York | Solo |
1987 | Collaborative American Printmaking from Whistler to the Present | Joe and Emily Lowe Art Gallery, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY | Group |
1987 | A Graphic Muse: Prints by Contemporary American Women | Mount Holyoke College Art Museum, South Hadley, MA | Group |
1986 | Untitled | Pasadena Collects, Pasadena Art Museum | Group |
1986 | Public and Private: American Prints Today | Brooklyn Museum of Art, NY | Group |
1985 | Focus on Realism: Selections from the Collection of Glenn C. Janss | Boise Gallery of Art, Idaho | Group |
1984 | American Women Artists-Part 1: 20th Century Pioneers | Sidney Janis Gallery, New York | Group |
1984 | Automobile and Culture | Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles | Group |
1984 | Landscapes | Matthews Hamilton Gallery, Philadelphia | Group |
1983 | Drawings by Painters | Long Beach Museum of Art, CA | Group |
1983 | The American Artist as Printmaker: 23rd National Print Exhibition | Brooklyn Museum, NY | Group |
1983 | American Still life 1945-1983 | Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TX | Group |
1983 | Hassam & Speicher Fund Purchase Exhibition | American Academy and Institute of Arts & Letters, New York | Group |
1983 | Drawings and Painted Bronzes | David McKee Gallery, New York | Solo |
1981 | Contemporary American Realism | Pennsylvania Academy of Art, Philadelphia | Group |
1981 | The Image of the House in Contemporary Works on Paper | Hayden Gallery, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA | Group |
1981 | The Contemporary American Landscape | Hirschl and Adler Contemporary Art, New York | Group |
1980 | Vija Celmins: A Survey Exhibition | Newport Harbor Art Museum, Newport Beach, CA | Solo |
1979 | The Decade in Review: Selection of the 1970's | Whitney Museum of American Art, New York | Group |
1978 | Vija Celmins | Security Pacific National Bank, Los Angeles | Solo |
1977 | American Artists: A New Decade | The Detroit Institute of Arts, MI | Group |
1977 | Painting and Sculpture in California: The Modern Era | San Francisco Museum of Modern Art | Group |
1977 | 30 Years of American Printmaking | The Brooklyn Museum, NY | Group |
1976 | America 1976 | Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. | Group |
1975 | A Drawing Show | Newport Harbor Art Museum, Newport Beach, CA | Group |
1975 | Recent Drawings | The Huntsville Museum of Art, AL | Group |
1975 | Untitled | Gallery of Art, Jackonsville, FL | Group |
1975 | Vija Celmins | Broxton Gallery, Los Angeles | Solo |
1975 | Vija Celmins | Felicity Samuel Gallery, London, England | Solo |
1974 | Seventy First American Exhibition | Art Institute of Chicago, IL | Group |
1973 | American Drawings 1963-1973 | Whitney Museum of American Art, New York | Group |
1973 | Vija Celmins | Riko Mizuno Gallery, Los Angeles | Solo |
1973 | Vija Celmins | Whitney Museum of American Art, New York | Solo |
1972 | California Prints | The Museum of Modern Art, New York | Group |
1972 | A Survey of West Coast Art from the Permanent Collection and Loan Collections | Pasadena Art Museum, CA | Group |
1972 | Eighteenth National Print Exhibition | Brooklyn Museum, NY | Group |
1971 | Continuing Surrealism | La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art, CA | Group |
1971 | 24 Young Los Angeles Artists | Los Angeles County Museum of Art | Group |
1970 | Annual of Contemporary American Sculpture | Whitney Museum of American Art, New York | Group |
1970 | Paperworks | The Museum of Modern Art, Art Lending Service, New York | Group |
1969 | Contemporary American Drawings | Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, TX | Group |
1969 | Vija Celmins | Riko Mizuno Gallery, Los Angeles | Solo |
1966 | Vija Celmins | David Stuart Galleries, Los Angeles, CA | Solo |