Maksla XO Gallery at POSITIONS BERLIN Art Fair 2026 –

Artists - Arturs Berzins, Paulis Liepa

Booth - B20

https://positions.de/start.html

Maksla XO Gallery presents at POSITIONS BERLIN 2026 – the exposition “Trading” by PAULIS LIEPA and “Trees Grow Where They Are Allowed; Trees Grow as They Are Allowed” by ARTURS BĒRZIŅŠ.

Arturs Berzins: “We perceive the environment in which we live as a scene. The environment leaves an impression on the human personality – perhaps it is our con-text. The environment is changeable and is changed mainly by man himself."
Arturs Berzins works with a specially cultivated drawing-painting technique, halfway between photography and painting, which the artist calls a long photograph in terms of time. His works are conceptual studies of what is happening today and what happened in the past.
In his latest works, “about trees”, the artist presents two interconnected series, each inspired by the landscape surrounding Olaine. The first consists of the artist’s analog photographs of the forests around the town. The second series bring together the contemporary urban landscape with references to the period of its rapid expansion in the 1960s and 1970s. Here, Bērziņš “plants” the stylized trees once drawn by Soviet Latvian architects into the city’s built environment, echoing the schematic forms that appeared in architectural plans of the period. The series also incorporates images of the sun inspired by works by well-known Latvian artists from that time.
https://www.makslaxogalerija.lv/eng/artists/arturs-berzins/

Paulis Liepa: “Trading, wrangling and bargaining – bartering wool for clamour, land for a seat in the front row, or for the larger slice of the pie. A struggle for position in the news feed and for more favourable interest rates. Flags – ragged edges, one’s own and foreign colours, primitive forms and broad areas of colour. Counting the spoils before they are secured and dividing into camps.Territories, spheres of influence, arrows and marks of recognition. The works are created using a relief printing technique, employing cardboardclichésand alkyd enamel, without the use of a printing press or other tools. Radical simplicity, a laconic colour palette, and a deliberate avoidance of the technical complexities characteristic of printmaking result in the use of primitive forms, large areas of colour, and coarsetextures. When printed on fabric, the works acquire a flag-like form, which constitutes a conceptually significant component of the exhibition’s underlying idea.” 
https://www.makslaxogalerija.lv/eng/artists/paulis-liepa/

Support:
Ltd “Mākslas galerija Māksla XO” on the 10th of April 2024 signed an agreement No 17.1-1-L-2024/189  with the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia on receiving support for export assistance under the project “SME Innovative Business Development” co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund.