With a Pinch of Salt by Amanda Ziemele

Amanda Ziemele (b. 1990, Latvia) is a visual artist whose work spans expanded painting, installation, and sculpture. She studied at the Latvian Academy of Arts and the Academy of Fine Arts Dresden. Her practice is characterized by an experimental use of color, materiality, and composition, exploring the relationship between surface, object, and space. She has exhibited in various international contexts and represented Latvia at the 2024 Venice Biennale.

In With a Pinch of Salt, Amanda Ziemele constructs spaces that breathe, where matter, color, and gesture intertwine like living organisms. Her work does not impose itself on the environment but inhabits it with humor and fluidity, like an architecture that dissolves into the landscape. Here, each form is an embodied intuition: a brushstroke and intervention on the body of the space.

Centro de Arte Limantour, in collaboration with Saenger Gallery, served as an artist residency and workspace for Amanda Ziemele. There, the works were produced in close relation to the architecture of the place, generating a constant dialogue between artist, work, and environment. Throughout the process, the pieces transformed, modifying their forms, colors, and textures in response to the inhabited space. 

This close relationship between artist and environment gives rise to site-specific exhibitions, where every decision responds to the architecture, atmosphere, and country of exhibition. She combines pigments she has previously explored with local materials, integrating tradition and context into her work. This dialogue between familiar and new colors adds texture and depth, connecting each piece with the place where it was created. Thus, the result is not a mere installation of works but an integrated and unique experience.

Allowing the audience to explore the work at their own pace and form a personal connection is fundamental to its meaning. The work unfolded and expanded during the creative process, without a rigid preconceived design. This openness to evolution within the space represents the importance of not imposing preconceived ideas but letting the environment and experience accompany the creation of the pieces.

Her works invite pause: to let the gaze rest and the imagination compose. They are not offered from a single side but can be experienced—front and back—as bodies that turn, breathe, and reveal layers in motion.

Hide-and-seek

Objects in mirror are closer than they appear.
Waves and particles are dancing around the corners of space

Who is younger night or day?
Volcanos are snoring close to chest;
Spellbound taste buds,
Chambers and heart strings,
Threshold for pleasure and knowledge leads you further.

Pluck the day!

— Amanda Zimele