METALLOphone: Museum (2020)
The International Biennial of Contemporary Metal Art METALLOphone will take place in Vilnius for the fifth time. It is the only international event celebrating metal art and jewellery in Lithuania that had been increasingly gaining scope and importance for artists and visitors alike. Its name is symbolic: a metallophone is an instrument capable of transforming metal into sound, and the sound of metal can become a sonorous narrative of innovative thoughts and images.
For the second time, the Biennial METALLOphone 2020 will be located in the space of the Lithuanian National Museum, in the historic bastion of Vilnius defensive wall – in one of the oldest museums of Vilnius, in the defence building from the first half of the 17th century. The bastion, first used for combat and defence, later became a museum the extraordinarily distinctive spaces of which speak of an urge to defend – if needed, with a weapon – in order to preserve what we have. This binding, distinct, historically significant space is ready to welcome contemporary metal artists. Therefore, the theme of the 2020 biennial is MUSEUM. Every artist has created works that they consider undoubtedly worthy of a museum; many an author walk the hallways of their imaginary museum.
Lastly, museum strategies, such as preserving, storing, presenting, interpreting, disseminating, can also serve as a pretext for works of art to emerge. The biennial METALLOphone: MUSEUM invites artists to create and present works that are worthy of being exhibited in a museum; to reflect on what a museum is today when thoughts of the majority are directed to the future rather than the past; and more generally, what our collective and personal past mean to us today. It is an opportunity to apply the museum principles to your creative processes. And take the unique opportunity to see your work exhibited alongside millennium-old artefacts showcased in the bastion.
Participants
METALLOphone is harmonised by
Soul and curator
phD. Jurgita Ludavičienė
Architect
Eimantas Ludavičius
Photographer of the photos used in the gallery
Vidmantas Ilčiukas
Organisers
The Lithuanian National Museum of Art,
Jewellery school-gallery Vilnensis
Partner
Vilnius Academy of Arts
The project is funded by
Lithuanian Council for Culture