Photomanipulation: a long photo in a long hospital corridor by LIAA member Liudas Parulskis

2024-10-01

On 3 October 2024 (Thursday) at 5 p.m. Vilnius University Hospital (Šiltnamių str. 29, the 1st floor of the central corridor of the building) will host an opening of the exhibition “Vilnius. Neris. The Other Side” by artist, LIAA member Liudas Parulskis.

The appearance of the photo in this space is due to two factors. The first is the most obvious – the artist’s own visits to the hospital and walking down the corridor to the treatments, recording how an infinitely long distance of the corridor at the beginning of the illness, without losing its length, is shortened to an easily traversable section at the end of the illness. The second factor was the hospital doctors’ suggestion to the artist to decorate the corridor somehow. Parulskis, after assessing the size of the proposed space and, in particular, its length, realised that this feature of the interior had to be introduced through the nearby flowing river. This would maintain the tradition of decorating hospitals with art (through landscapes) and create a new message, synthesising the experience of artificial and natural (river) corridors for the most natural viewers – the patients, their visitors and the doctors – as they walk or are transported along the gigantic corridor at different speeds.

The artist took the panoramic photo over the course of a year, shooting from one side of the river to the other. The process involved cycling, kayaking and walking. Parulskis used his expedition experience to create a ranking of the greatest dangers that await a traveller on the Panera:

1. Loose dogs

2. Not knowing what to say to woke strays

3. Stepping on a drug addict’s tool

4. Ticks

5. Nettles

The 35-metre-long photograph included 15 kilometres of the Neris riverbank from the first Valakampiai beach to Lazdynai, 13 bridges and two islands. When the shots were edited into a single photograph, it turned out that Vilnius, from the perspective of the river, is two-thirds forest, so the artist enlivened this relatively monotonous image with hidden (but findable) artefacts, both historical and fantastical.

Liudas Parulskis – Photographer, creator of photo and video manipulations, designer of commemorative and circulation coins. Together with actress Eglė Mikulionytė, he created the theatrical performance “Expectations and Other Commodities” (theatre festival “Sirenos”). Participant of the Street Art Vilnius festival. Member of the Lithuanian Interdisciplinary Artists’ Association (LIAA).

The exhibition is funded by LIAA – Lithuanian Interdisciplinary Artists’ Association