Urtė Janus

A few final images of Flowing Bodies, an installation that lived underground for a month inside the Panevėžys Water Reservoir, my beloved Lithuania, part of a network of water storage chambers scattered across the landscape and supplying water to the region ⚗️ Thinking of the space as a giant belly, a great vessel, I worked with local ceramic craftsmen using ancient waterproofing techniques such as sourdough and milk ceramics to explore ideas of bodies, vessels, porosity, and holding. The vessels were filled, yet could never fully contain, the fermenting liquids made from yeasts gathered from the local air and herbs and microorganisms living in wild water, reflecting on the very blurred boundaries between life, ‘non-life’, and death. Part of a wider series of exhibitions in unconventional sites, organised by @av17_gallery . 📷 @pauliuszidonis

Flowing Bodies just before closing last week ⚗️ The installation was crying, sweating, dripping, fermenting, oxidising, rotting, rusting, growing, crystallising and dying for a month at the Panevėžys underground water reservoir in Lithuania. Part of a wider series of exhibitions in unconventional sites, organised by @av17_gallery . 📷 @pauliuszidonis

Some more documentation of Flowing Bodies, currently on view for its final week at the Panevėžys underground water reservoir in Lithuania. This installation was created specifically for the space, imagining the reservoir as a vast vessel - an underground body where metabolic processes unfold. I wanted to work with clay and traditionally shaped vessels, arranged in repetition so they begin to resemble bellies or organ systems: both containers and bodies that hold, yet never fully contain, always seeping, sweating, dripping. By using variations of ancient clay waterproofing techniques and collaborating with local traditional artisans, we made the vessels sweat, cry, and leak. I wanted the installation to become a space where living and dying happen simultaneously, so I worked with wild yeasts and bacteria harvested from the surrounding air and water to make visible ( and also olfactory ) the fermentation, metabolism and decay that continuously take place around us, within us, and moving through us. The installation is part of a wider series of exhibitions in unconventional sites, organised by @av17_gallery . 📷 @pauliuszidonis

Some more documentation of Flowing Bodies, currently open at the Panevėžys underground water reservoir until the end of the month. These pieces were made in collaboration with traditional ceramic craftsmen using different waterproofing techniques that predate glazes. I call them the crying vessels. The brown ones were created using the ancient milk ceramics process, in which clay is dipped into milk before firing. All the vessels are filled with wild and domesticated water, and in some of them fermentation processes are taking place. Each technique gives the clay a different porosity, making it sweat and cry as the liquids seep through the clay bodies, fermenting, rusting, rotting, crystallising. Interestingly, the walls of the reservoir are stained a deep red. My guess is that the iron in the stored water has coloured them this way. These pieces are slowly rusting too, as metabolic bacterial and mineral processes unfold within the bellies of clay. The installation is part of a wider series of exhibitions in unconventional sites, organised by @av17_gallery . 📷 @pauliuszidonis

Some more documentation of Flowing Bodies, currently open at the Panevėžys underground water reservoir, which I imagined as a vast container, an underground belly, where metabolic reactions and chemical flows take place. The reservoir is part of a larger water storage system managed by a water company that supplies the surrounding region. These are the acid fountains, created in collaboration with local ceramic craftsmen using traditional Lithuanian sourdough ceramics. The patterns on the clay are formed by dipping it while hot into sourdough starter - a method that predates glazes and was originally used to waterproof clay vessels. The fountains are filled with an acidic liquid that I developed over a month in collaboration with wild local yeasts, bacteria, nearby plants, and wild water. By feeding the yeasts sugar I created alcohol, which then nourished acetobacteria, producing an acidic liquid that continues to ferment and interact with the space throughout the exhibition. Interestingly, once I poured this liquid into the fountains it gradually turned from milky white to pitch black. The plant tannins in the liquid reacted with the acid, iron, and lime in the vessels to form iron acetate. A complete accident, but I later learned that this is the same chemistry used in traditional iron gall ink. By working with different ancient ceramic waterproofing techniques across the exhibition, I wanted to reflect on porosity, on never really being a closed system, but instead an open part of the whole, through which water carries nutrients, minerals, metals, pollutants, and toxins. Thank you @av17_gallery for this wonderful opportunity as well as all my human and more than human collaborators who helped to bring this to life. 📷 @pauliuszidonis

Dalinamės Panevėžio požeminiame vandens rezervuare iki rugsėjo 28 d. pristatomos Urtės Janus (@urte.janus ) parodos „Tekantys kūnai“ fragmentais 🤍 Parodoje pristatomi skulptūriniai objektai iš vario, geležies, keramikos pripildyti skysčių, kurie natūralių cheminių reakcijų dėka parodos metu keičiasi. Remdamasi vandenvietės istorija ir tyrinėdama čionykščiame vandenyje ištirpusias chemines medžiagas, jų poveikį aplinkai ir transformacines savybes, autorė rezervuarą paverčia tranzmitoriumi tarp gyvojo ir negyvojo pasaulių. Urtės Janus parodos pristatymas yra didesnio (AV17) galerijos vykdomo projekto dalis, kurio metu Lietuvos jaunųjų tarpdisciplininių menininkių kūryba yra pristatoma netradicinėse erdvėse. Jau rugsėjo 11 d. Kauno tvirtovės IV forto poternoje atidaroma trečioji, menininkės Romos Salės, paroda „Alternatyvios istorijos“. Urtės Janus parodos lankymo laikas: IV-V 17-19 val. VI 12-16 val. P. Židonio nuotr. Projektą finansuoja Lietuvos kultūros taryba. @panevezysnow

Earthworm Fantasies, 16-27.07 closing event tomorrow with @agaujma curated and text by @urte.janus @artspaceoctagon hosted by @nunheadcemetery thank you to @atelier.wama and @wtorpol

Earthworm Fantasies, 16-27.07 curated and text by @urte.janus @artspaceoctagon hosted by @nunheadcemetery closing event this Sunday with @agaujma thank you to @atelier.wama and @wtorpol

Earthworm Fantasies, 16-27.07 curated and text by @urte.janus Project Octagon, hosted by @nunheadcemetery closing event this Sunday with @agaujma a big thank you to @atelier.wama and @wtorpol

Earthworm Fantasies, 17-27.07.2025 curated and text by @urte.janus Project Octagon, hosted by @nunheadcemetery closing event 27.07 with @agaujma thank you to @atelier.wama and @wtorpol

Earthworm Fantasies opened yesterday and is on view until 27.07 🪱 curated and text by @urte.janus artspaceoctagon hosted by @nunheadcemetery Join us for a closing event on 27 July with live harp performances by @agaujma 🪱 Nunhead Cemetery, Linden Grove, London SE15 3LP a big thank you to @atelier.wama and @wtorpol

Urtė Janus, Sea of Tears, 2024. Stainless steel frame, salt from the Dead Sea engraved with tears, 30 x 30 cm. The group show “Oyster Ears” runs until Jan 11! @urte.janus #urtejanus @editorial_projects