Biography
Painter Nikolajs Krivošeins was born on 25 February 1960 in Kirov, Russia. He received his first higher education at the Riga Civil Aviation Engineering Institute. Alongside his studies in aviation, Krivošeins attended masterclasses in visual art from 1978 to 1990, under the realist painters Abram Bykov (1925–2007) and Vitaly Karkunov (1925–2006). In 1993, he commenced studies at the Painting Department of the Art Academy of Latvia, where he studied under famous painters like Imants Vecozols (1933) and Vilis Ozols (1929–2014). After completing his bachelor’s degree, he continued his studies under Aleksejs Naumovs (1955) and Kaspars Zariņš (1962), graduating from the Academy in 1999. Since 1995, Krivošeins has run his own visual arts studio, and he currently lives and works in Riga.[1]
Artistic Style
Krivošeins’ work is defined by the tension between two painterly traditions – early in his career, he worked within the realist school, but for more than 25 years, he has been devoted to abstraction. His painting is emotionally charged, grounded in the power of colour and its multi-layered transitions. In place of subject matter, the artist chooses to convey feeling through colour chords, rhythms, and contrasts, frequently turning to moods of anxiety and unease, embodied in fields of red, yellow, violet, and black that speak to the viewer much as musical notes do. He seeks out the threshold states of colour – the points where a tone becomes indeterminate or merges with another. His style is characterised by spontaneity and an embrace of chance; he does not seek to repeat himself and holds that each canvas demands a fresh approach. Krivošeins favours working on a large scale, which allows his abstractionist vision full expression. Painting for him is an expression of freedom and emotional intensity, in which the living resonance of colour plays the central role.[2]
Interesting Facts
Breaking with conventional notions of exhibition openings, in 2016, Krivošeins presented a show featuring only a single painting, “Everything Is Quiet in Baghdad”. The work was created in 2003 as a large-format canvas (190x360 cm), reflecting the artist’s vision of the global political events of that time and the complex, unsettling picture they produce.[3]
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