The “Water and Cities” photo exhibition , from St. Petersburg’s artist Maria Kremneva, was opened in the Rietumu Bank Gallery. The exposition presents about 40 large-format works. Each of them has water present or a city area reflected in the water, an urbanistic motive which thus acquires a new and often unexpected sense.
Maria Kremneva has been seriously engaged in photography for over 35 years. She travels a lot and often visits capitals and big cities of Europe which become the heroes of her works. Since late 1990s, she has been regularly participating in exhibitions. The biggest recent exhibitions of Maria Kremneva were held in 2015 in St. Petersburg - “Phenomenality of Reflection” in the exhibition hall of the Petropavlovsk Fortress and “Seven Days in Paris” in the museum of miniatures “Russian Left-handler”.
One of the cross-cutting themes in her art are reflections of the urban landscape on the water surface, which has never been static in the works of Kremneva - on the contrary, it is always dynamic and mobile. The author succeeds in skilfully capturing this movement and images of the reflected objects also acquire energy and dynamics of the environment, at the same time transforming, acquiring new colours, shades and nuances.
Most of the works presented on the exhibition have been made in two cities very close to Maria Kremneva - St. Petersburg and Amsterdam. The historical fates of these European capitals are related to rivers, canals and sea, next to which they are located. Water not only forms an integral part of their landscape, but also largely determines their fates and characters. Besides, the exposition presents photos made in Riga, Paris, Lisbon, Rome and Bruges – the cities, which are also closely connected and coexisting with the water area.
Critics and spectators often note that works of Maria Kremneva refer to the paintings of impressionists, postimpressionists and divisionists. Things and details there are as if divided into particles - either in splashes of water, in mobile ripple or in water bits. The plots are built in a surprisingly precise and interesting way - spectators see the already accustomed object of the city environment as if anew and not always recognise it, even when the photo is made in their home city.
Maria Kremneva’s artistic play with the world of reflections will bring not only aesthetic pleasure to the spectators, but will also allow them to feeling deeper the constant variability of the reflected world at a deeper level.
Admission to the exhibition is, as always, free.
Eleonora Gailisha Mass Media and Public Relations
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