Each year a special place in the museum's exhibition schedule is allotted to the organization of contemporary art exhibitions: Latvian artists' solo exhibitions, exhibitions of various art disciplines, as well as joint exhibitions of decorative art and design. During the 20 years of the museum's existence the motivation to hold joint exhibitions was different. At first, these exhibitions were held in spring during the traditional Art Days. Later on, promoting higher criteria for contemporary art, joint thematic exhibitions were organized. After a lapse of several years, in 2009, the museum resumed the organization of joint exhibitions and the exhibition ”Intimate in Art” won great acclaim by artists and the museum's visitors.

This year another joint exhibition ”Optimization of Art” is organized. The particular exhibition is envisaged as a show of decorative art and design, which, within the frames of the theme, has to reflect the latest processes and phenomena in these particular art fields. The explanation of the theme (term in the title) is diverse in meaning and can be interpreted in several ways: 1. ”to optimize” means - make optimal, get the most out of, use best, exploit fully, get the maximum use out of. 2. ”optimal” means – most desirable, possible under a restriction expressed or implied. The artworks of the exhibition show that the theme is interpreted even in a vaster sense, up to cosmic, or bears other implications and ways of philosophical reasoning, depending on each single artist's imagination. The exhibition holds extremely diverse artworks executed by 72 professional artists, as well as the artworks created by the students of the Art Academy of Latvia in the years 2009/2010.

Choosing the theme of this year, the intention of the museum was to link it with the present situation in Latvia and the hard reforms, which are currently under way, and are called ”optimization” by the government. The aim of the exhibition is to size up the situation and, probably, try to find an answer to the question: How is optimization influencing creative work and how it gets reflected in art? The visitors will have the possibility to vote for the artist who, in their opinion, has created the most convincing and relevant artwork on the theme. The artist will be awarded a Special Prize.

Hard art optimization work designing and mounting the exhibition was done by the artist, exhibition designer Jurģis Krāsons and the exhibition installer Uldis Timoško.

Alīda Krēsliņa, curator of the exhibition

DMDM-Optimizacija_LNMM_2010.doc

LNMM_Svētdinas Sarunas.doc