Riga Photography Biennial 2026 program introduced

From April 16 to July 3, the Riga Photography Biennial 2026 program will happen, that includes an intensive exhibition and academic program. The first Riga Photography Biennial (RPB) passed off in 2016. This yr, the Riga Photography Biennial 2026 marks a decade-long journey thematically analyzing the phenomenon of self-existence/coexistence in varied potential contexts, together with the influence of expertise on human nature, the connection between man and nature, in addition to the informative code of the up to date picture.

The central occasion of RPB 2026—the exhibition ‘Zoom In: Ecology’—will happen from April 17 to June 14 on the ‘Riga Contemporary Art Space’ exhibition corridor. Of all of the essential questions that occupy human minds, one is everlasting: tips on how to survive? It’s a query that may flip right away from a seemingly prosaic drawback with a rational resolution right into a common riddle to which there isn’t a reply. Just like there isn’t a resolution to the presently acute contradiction between the human need to regulate and exploit pure methods and our negligible information about them – nobody can absolutely clarify the workings of ecosystems or what determines organic range on Earth. The exhibition ‘Zoom In: Ecology’ presents 9 reflections on human merging with digital applied sciences and/or nature. It investigates how digital actions affect ecosystems, pure assets and human nature, making an attempt to navigate via this finely crafted internet of relationships. Curators: Inga Brūvere (LV), Marie Sjøvold (NO). Participants: Astrid Ardagh (NO), Nanna Debois Buhl (DK), Henna-Riikka Halonen (FI), Inka & Niclas (SE), Kristina Õllek & Kert Viiart-Õllek (EE), Rasa Šmite and Raitis Šmits (LV), Sabīne Šnē (LV), Istvan Virag (HU/NO)

In the Intro Hall of ‘Riga Contemporary Art Space’ from April 17 to June 7, Priyageetha Dia (NL), in her solo exhibition ‘everything you need to see is already in front of you’, questions pictures as a medium – repository of recollections. Her perspective is rooted within the historical past of her household in South-East Asia, within the Malay Peninsula, which in its heyday was thought of to be essentially the most worthwhile colony within the British Empire. Working with archives and conducting subject analysis in rubber plantations, Priyageetha Dia approaches the previous from completely different sides. Curator: Inga Brūvere.

To exist is all the time to exist alongside others – folks, methods, recollections and presences that stay partially unseen. Exhibition’s ‘A Vocabulary for Ghosts’ curator Paulius Petraitis (LT) and contributors Saskia Fischer (DE), Tom Lovelace (UK), Ona Barbora Šlapšinskaitė (LT) suggest that co-existence will not be solely a social or political situation, but additionally a type of cohabiting with ghosts: invisible forces, archived and unarchived recollections, and quiet presences that inhabit the periphery of our consideration. The exhibition, which will probably be on view on the ASNI Gallery from April 18 to May 20, brings collectively three inventive practices, every illuminating a special dimension of the “ghostly” in up to date life.

From April 19 to May 31, the ALMA Gallery will host Māra Brašmane’s solo exhibition ‘My Friends’, that includes the artist’s first pictures, shot between 1965 and 1969 together with her father’s large-format Woigtländer digital camera. The black-and-white pictures present bohemians, artists and writers in a free, relaxed ambiance – college students who, over the next many years, would develop into the brand new era of Riga intellectuals. But at this level, Laima Eglīte, Eižens Valpēters, Eva Gurviča, Juris Pudāns and others are nonetheless speaking about their future goals within the cafes ‘Kaza’ and ‘Putnu Dārzs’, expressing their emotions, issues and seek for self as younger folks. Curator: Kristians Fukss (LV).

From April 24 to July 3, the ISSP Gallery will host an exhibition ‘Dzen’ by Latvian artist Rūta Kalmuka. The sequence of works relies on the traditional solstice traditions of “driving of the birds” and “calling of the birds”, which had been attribute of locations inhabited by Livonians. In these rituals, giant birds symbolised illnesses and evil spirits, whereas small birds had been attributed the meanings of sunshine and awakening. With the assistance of pictures and butoh motion, the artist interprets this ritual as a metaphor for inside cleaning – the need to forged off the darkness and make house for a brand new starting. Curator: Iveta Gabaliņa (LV).

At the top of April, the group exhibition ‘Colour as Message. Colour Photography Before the Digital and AI Era’ will open on the ‘Istaba’ Gallery, the place curator Irēna Bužinska (LV) will encourage guests to mirror on the evolution of pictures. We stay in a vibrant world, and one of many issues confronted within the early days of pictures was the shortcoming to seize the encompassing actuality in equal quantities of color. Hence, the colourising of pictures by hand – with the intention to obtain better verisimilitude or give the picture a selected inventive high quality – appeared virtually concurrently the invention of the photographic course of. Yet in lots of circumstances, a lot broader and, from a documentary perspective, seemingly extra exact prospects had been additionally developed to enhance or “enhance” actuality, thus decreasing and even eliminating all these visible imperfections current in a selected individual or an precise place. The exhibition will current hand-coloured pictures by unknown artists courting from the mid-Nineteenth century onwards and held in a number of non-public collections, in addition to color pictures by the up to date Latvian artists Kristīne Luīze Avotiņa, Artūrs Bērziņš, Valdis Celms, Lilija Dinere and Atis Ieviņš, all of that are courtesy of their authors. The exhibition will probably be on view from April 28 to May 29.

The Riga Photography Biennial can be heading exterior Riga. From May 5 to June 4, the exhibition ‘Side by Side. Three Looks at the Same Place’ on the Talsi Municipality Museum, will examine the probabilities of co-existence amongst completely different visible languages. Three artists – a painter Katrīna Vīnerte, a photographer Uldis Banga, working with analogue expertise, and a photographer Dainis Kārklvalks, working with digital expertise – doc the identical place, every of them using their very own medium, their very own rhythm, their very own instrument of notion and interpretation. Curator: Uldis Jaunzems-Pētersons.

From May 10 to 24, pictures from Irēna Bužinska’s assortment ‘Indoors-Outdoors. Rigans in Salon Photography. Late 19th Century–1940’ will probably be on view at Riga public transport stops, revealing how “the outdoors” would seem inside studios – painted nature: groves, particular person timber, a nook of a park with a pond, a seashore or a romantic damage. But from June 10 via September 27, the Mikhail Chekhov Riga Russian Theatre Gallery will host Ieva Epnere’s solo exhibition ‘Tuesday’ by which the artist turns to the topic of herself and an remark of the cyclical nature of life. The exhibition is curated by Roberta Atraste, winner of the RPB – NEXT 2025 Award ‘Emerging Curator!’.

The RFB 2026 exhibition may also be complemented by an academic program: a lecture ‘Coexistence: Natural/Artificial. Polish Photography After AI’ by Adam Mazur (PL) on April 30, an artists’ symposium curated by Maija Rudovska titled ‘Togetherness’ on May 21, in addition to a inventive workshop for kids and younger folks with artist Līga Spunde on May 30. A particular program publication, which can delve much more deeply into the problems explored through the occasions, may also be obtainable for buy on the exhibition and occasion venues.

The Riga Photography Biennial is a global up to date artwork occasion, specializing in the evaluation of visible tradition and inventive illustration. The time period ‘photography’ within the title of the biennial is used as an all-embracing idea encompassing a combined vary of inventive image-making practices which have continued to rework the lexicon of up to date artwork within the twenty first century. The biennial covers points starting from cultural principle to present socio-political processes within the Baltics and the broader European area. Using the format of an artwork pageant, Riga Photography Biennial makes an attempt to document modifications going down everywhere in the world and invitations us to collectively interpret them – one thing we not solely must see but additionally think about while translating the difficult and oversaturated up to date visible language into significant relationships between our every day actuality, the digital camera lens, historic materials, up to date artwork, applied sciences and the longer term. How has our understanding of pictures and picture modified due to digital applied sciences, and the way does it present itself within the murals? For the organisers of the biennial these are essential inquiries to current and analyse, while on the similar time introducing Latvian audiences to main works of worldwide artwork in addition to the concepts of distinguished artwork theoreticians offered within the type of symposiums, discussions and publications in parallel with exhibitions and performances. For extra data: www.rpbiennial.com

Supporters and companions of the Riga Photography Biennial 2026: State Culture Capital Foundation of Latvia, Riga City Council, exhibition corridor ‘Riga Contemporary Art Space’, Gallery ‘ALMA’, Gallery ‘ASNI’, ISSP Gallery, gallery ‘Istaba’, Talsi Municipality Museum, Nordic Council of Ministers’ Office in Latvia, Estonian Embassy in Riga, Embassy of Finland in Riga, ‘Rixwell Hotels’, ‘Hibnerstudio’, printing home ‘Adverts’, ‘Artglass by Groglass’, ‘Riga Art Week’ (RAW), Arterritory.com, Echo Gone Wrong, NOBA