Valda Batraks

Valda Batraks
Formerly: Mikāne
Profession: designer
Field: Graphics
Creative organization: Latvian Artists Union (since 1989)
Residence: Rīga, Latvia
Awards: Parchemin d'Honneur, Chamalieres, France, 1997 Honorable Mention World Heritage Series Postage Stamp Design Contest Tokyo, Japan, 2003.
Biography:
Personal Exhibitions:
Rīgas Galerija, Riga, Latvia 1993
Karlskoga, Sweden 1996
Rīgas Galerija, Riga, Latvia 1997
European Commission Headquarters, Riga, Latvia 1998
Competitions:
Fourth International Miniature Graphic Triennale, Chamalieres, France 1997
The 9 th International Biennial Print & Drawing Exhibition, R.O.C., 1999, Taipei, Taiwan
The 10 th International Biennial Print & Drawing Exhibition, R.O.C., 2001, Taipei, Taiwan
The 11 th International Biennial Print & Drawing Exhibition, R.O.C., 2003, Taipei, Taiwan
World Heritage Series Postage Stamp Design Contest, Tokyo, Japan, 2003.
The 12 th International Biennial Print & Drawing Exhibition, R.O.C., 2006, Taipei, Taiwan:
Web sites:
www.pasts.lv www.tmoa.gov.tw
Other projects
First Day envelope and cancellation rubber stamp designs for Latvian Post Office
Postage stamp designs in series EUROPA: 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005
Commemorative stamp - EU Candidates, European Union, 2004, with JP Advertising Ltd., Malta
Graphic artworks in Directory of Print CD, International Print Triennial Society, Krakow: 2001, 2003
http://www.makslinieki.lv/profile/2209/%20-%209k

The acutely etched and smoothly rolled surfaces in Valda Batraks’ work suspend moments of reflection and awareness that echo across the textured landscapes of her busy, cerebrally vivid compositions. The collisions of light with darkness, self with environment, and form with identity all energize the faces formed by her pencils and lithography. Batraks bestows a glacial density to the patterns and physical properties of the contexts she confronts in her art, which ranges from powerfully sculpted collages of floating patterns and symbology in the spirit of Gustav Klimt to elementally stripped down, expressionist explorations into the impact of space and surroundings, where her choices of media challenge her surfaces and tones with ambitious studies of mass and dimension.

Batraks’ art has been showcased internationally in her native Latvia and around Europe, also earning several nominations and selection in the “International Print Biennial Awardees Theme” category at the Taiwan Art Fair in 1999. Her work was also selected for a Latvian Post Office postage stamp in 2003.

http://www.art-mine.com/ArtistPage/Valda_Batraks.aspx