Ona Juciūtė at CCA Derry/Londonderry

Ona Juciūtė | Joiners

Curated by Catherine Hemelryk

April 23- July 2, 2022

CCA Derry/Londonderry, 10–12 Artillery St Derry~Londonderry BT48 6RG, Northern Ireland

Documentation Simon Mills @ CCA Derry/Londonderry Northern Ireland, UK 

Pelicans, 2022, dimensions variable. Wood veneer, varnish, chromed steel,
polyester.

Joiners, 2022, single channel video projection, 8:25 mins.

Ona Juciūtė is interested in the practices
and shifts of making today. She works across sculpture, installation and moving
images. In her first solo UK presentation, Ona made a set of sculptures specifically
for this show. Here she is exploring parallels between tailoring, clothing and
furniture-making following her month-long residency at CCA Derry/Londonderry.

Gallery 1 houses a series of sculptures Pelicans
constructed from wood veneers inspired by the parallels in the declining
industries of Derry~Londonderry (shirt factories) and Ona’s home city of
Vilnius (timber). Ona inverts the veneers’ logical form as something that is
not intended to exist as a surface devoid of its own structure or form by creating
structural forms. The forms maintain their shape using pelican clips, familiar
to domestic settings, nails and intersecting veneer planes. Ona returns the
material to a state that borderlines industry and nature, with organic,
leaf-like qualities. The sculptures also feature clothing tags as a reference
to the changing relationships between wearers and their garments. Tags became
popular when industrial materials and textile blends took over from wool,
cotton and silk as people no longer knew how to care for their complex
garments. Ona sees them as a message from the makers to the owners, becoming
washed out through time and use.

The video piece Joiners connects
patchwork making practices of former Factory Girls of Derry and a story of Ona’s
father – a retired carpenter – and his relationship with the changing world
through his skill. In the film, the lens tracks the stitches and fabrics of the
quilt constructed from shirt and pyjama material offcuts, made by former shirt
factory workers. Architectural landscape of Derry is still dominated by the
once prosperous textile industry. The projection’s scale aims to create a
landscape from the quilt; we navigate the contours of the folds, valleys and
ridges as we explore the different textures and threads. The camera lens’ journey
judders to echo the surging path of the sewing machine’s foot. The film’s text
begins mid-conversation with Ona asking her father questions about his ways of
making. He describes how he chooses leftover pieces of wood and other materials
discarded from other projects and how he pieces them together to make new
furniture.

Ona Juciūtė is a visual artist based in
Vilnius, Lithuania. She works across sculpture, installation, moving image and
textile. She has exhibited in and collaborated with Contemporary Art Centre in
Vilnius, Lithuanian National Gallery, MOCAK museum in Krakow, Galerie Stadtpark
Krems Austria, AiR Krems Austria, Künstlerdorf Sch
öppingen Foundation, RUPERT, Editorial and
Swallow projects spaces in Vilnius. In 2021 her sculptures were included in the
permanent collection of Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma in Helsinki.