Aija Jurjāne was one of the first feminist voices in Latvian painting, while being very gentle and modest. With her work, she tried to show and prove that everyday life is worthy of much brighter colours. Despite this, her name has been heard much less than one would like. Her work tells the story of her as a creator, but not much is known about her personal life. The reason is the classic one: the artist did not enjoy publicity.
“Art was part of who she was.”
Aija was born at historical crossroad in 1944. She, like many, was caught up in more than one such crossroad during her life – the painful changes of power, the collapse of the USSR and everything that followed. During these moments of change, Aija painted, and, as her art tells us, she took everything she wanted and everything that was up for the taking from each time period.
She graduated from the Janis Rozentals Art School, where she spent mere forty years: first as a student, then as a permanent teacher of painting and composition. One could say that she devoted her life to art, but that would only be partly true.
Current documentation
A frosty winter day. In the background, thick white snowdrifts, and in the foreground, a grandmother in a bright yellow headdress, bending down to check if her grandson has fallen asleep in the pram.
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And there’s a young mum, scraping soot from a saucepan, while a carefree merry-go-round with children swirls around (either in reality or figuratively).
These were roughly the scenes of everyday life that Aija depicted most often. She saw something very important, something very inspiring in the mundane. She certainly did not underestimate it – she elevated the ordinary and painted it in the most vivid colours.
Many people will now think that she simply idealised the world around her, but it’s deeper than that. She called what she was doing “documenting the present”. She documented both the greatest joys and the greatest sorrows, but with one important condition: never to portray despair without hope. This seems to be the key to understanding her work and the unconditional light that shines from it.
“I try to look at everything from the comic side. Including myself.” This approach was an important part of her way of life, and her paintings are clear proof of this. Aija couldn’t stand artificiality – in art, in life, in other people and in herself. That is why her art comes across as so honest.
Artist. Teacher. Mother
These are the main and primary roles in Aija’s life. She was a mother of three, a beloved teacher, all the while creating art. “Summer. The Jurjans family home in Berģi. The smell of buns baking. Aija at her easel and her grandchildren playing outside the window.”
This is how Aija’s pupil Anna Auziņa remembers the artist’s house. For her, the main roles in life were inseparable, just as they are in the lives of millions of other women. And the vast number of images in Aija’s paintings are about the same thing – the “super-woman”. She argued that every woman was worthy of the title. “What Aija painted is something she couldn’t afford not to paint,” says her daughter, Kristīne Jurjāne, also a well-known artist and set designer.
Aija kept diaries, making entries almost daily. These notes contain little pathos: they are mostly simple jottings on whether the children have recovered from sickness, whether the soup tasted good today, how work was going and which artist she had discovered in the last few days. Fragments of her diaries are collected in a monographic art album „The Fountain of Youth“, published in 2021. It is also the story of a woman’s destiny and the incredible power that resides in each of them.
“And the most important thing is love. It is love.”
So said Aija’s husband, artist Juris Jurjāns, three years after her passing. For the artist herself, love seems to have been the main driving force in her work and life. For example, we know very well of the love she had for her many pupils, who passed through her life constantly. One of them recalled: “She taught us first to be decent people and only then to become artists.”
Aija was sharp, direct, spoke her mind and certainly didn’t tolerate students doing superficial work. The same students remember her rare talent for inspiring people, and that in her presence everyone felt special. Perhaps this neutrality was one facet of her love. And her paintings are, of course, also about love. What were the other facets? Well, you’ll just have to see for yourselves.
The Queen’s Kitchens
Aijas’s last exhibition was held in 2019 at the “Daugava“ gallery. A few works in an unimpressive room – the conditions were insufficient to fully experience what dwells in these paintings. After five long years, her canvases and prints will finally be exhibited in their entirety – two floors of the Latvian National Museum of Art will be dedicated to them.
The space is designed in the form of seven metaphorical kitchens (it is no coincidence that we started this story about the artist with a tailored question). A closer acquaintance with Aija’s work will make it clear that every woman is a queen in this sense, and the kitchen is a lasting image of incredible feminine strength, versatility and love. We hope that you too will be able to feel this love.
