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A painter exploring the relationship between body and emotion, the boundaries of inner freedom and vulnerability.
Raimonda Petraitė (b. 1992), known under the pseudonym mone Kielė, is a contemporary figurative painter whose work balances between intense emotional expression and the tangible presence of physical matter. She graduated from the Vilnius Academy of Arts, Kaunas Faculty (BA in Painting), and later studied at Vilnius University, Faculty of Philosophy, where she obtained a qualification in pedagogy.
The artist lives and works in the countryside, having previously resided in Lithuanian cities and abroad. This movement between places and states of being resonates throughout her work – where urban tension merges with a sense of closeness to nature, and the human figure becomes a bridge between the external and internal worlds.
mone Kielė’s painting is marked by gestural immediacy and dynamic color contrasts – from flesh tones to deep reds, violets, and blues that do not merely describe form but reveal emotional states. Her figures often appear distorted or uneasy; yet, it is precisely this deformation that allows the viewer to see the human body not as an object but as an experience.
In her works, the body becomes a battlefield – a site where the desire for freedom, defense, vulnerability, and resistance meet. These are not portraits but topographies of states: gestures, postures, and bodily tension act as emotional codes. At times, this energy erupts into theatrical expression; at others, it retreats into a fragile stillness, reminiscent of breath after a storm.
Her painting carries a subtle connection to the earth and its cycles – not through direct imagery, but through the materiality of paint itself: the density of pigment, the rhythm of the brushstroke, like the pulse of nature, embody the instinct for life and resistance.
mone Kielė has held eight solo exhibitions in Lithuania and the Czech Republic, participates in group exhibitions, and her works are part of private collections in Lithuania and abroad.
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