For the renowned artist Imants Tillers, whose career spans more than
four decades of prolific creative practice, this "journey to nowhere" is
neither a homecoming nor a departure, but a fertile and
thought-provoking meeting of worlds. The son of Latvian parents who were
displaced during the Second World War, Tillers was born in Sydney,
Australia, where he spoke Latvian before English and long felt the pull
of a distant culture. Displacement, diaspora, and an awareness of the
complex weave of cultures mark all his work, from his experiments with
installation in the 1970s and trailblazing appropriations in the 1980s
to the holistic system of modular (canvasboard) paintings.
With contributions from Elita Ansone, Graham Coulter-Smith, Mark
Ledbury, Ian McLean, and Tillers himself, this publication traces the
artist's career through his most formative journeys, be they physical,
collaborative, or philosophical. As the work crosses vast physical,
metaphysical, and mytho-poetic terrain, our authors find themselves in
Karosta, Papunya, Cooma, and many distant art-historical shores along
the way. From this complex odyssey emerges a distinct and creative
vision, that of a visual philosopher who identifies as an outsider in
the city of his birth and visitor in his homeland.
