OFLUXO

Kuš!, throughout its incarnation, represents and recognises the rebel in us. Perhaps though not the rebel we immediately think of. Theirs is a quiet voice, yet one amplified through their creative and thoughtful impulse to represent the human condition in all its raw fallibility. It is in the creation of parallel worlds that resemble our own; characters with flaws, ticks and unresolved trauma. To escape this world for a moment means to look back at our own with renewed strength and perspective. Comics and graphic novels have always been a form of escape, but also of finding abstract meaning in the extreme present, or not-so-distant past.

Despite Latvia’s strong literary tradition, comics were a relative unknown to its culture on both sides of the soviet occupation. The combination of text and image however is not unknown to a unique culture known for their narrative and graphic tales of heroes, legends, pagan deities and rituals embracing the laws of man, nature and symbols of the divine. In contemporary Latvia’s hyper consumerist society, as it dives ever deeper into the free market, with all its material trappings, trends and superficialities, Kuš! provides a new generation with the words and images to cope – hard-hitting, trippy, scary, funny – and always playful.

Not as well known within Latvia as it is abroad, Kuš! has quietly and fastidiously done its thing now for 15 years, through the creation of its signature pocket sized publications, workshops, exhibitions, and an international residency program – something seriously lacking in the Latvian cultural sector. Promoting the graphic and comic medium has always been its goal, as has placing Latvian talent alongside international artists. It has fostered and supported the practice of several formerly unknown Latvian artists, as their respective careers began to blossom at home and further abroad.

Kuš! has given a voice to the quiet, the shy, and the gifted. This exhibition is a celebration of this, and to the quiet rebel in all of us. So thank you, happy anniversary, and may you continue to tell tales both mundane and profound, to entertain and inspire us.