I remember myself at 6 or 7 years old, playing under this colossal willow tree, which, being the height of the 4-floor apartment building I lived in, was the main axis of my childhood playground. We would climb this massive plant and spend hours in the nook in between the branches; it was the centerpiece of all of our games – this is where “hide and seek” counts were made and “tuku-tuku’s”, while chasing, were completed.

It was under the weeping branches and among the roots of this willow where we made and hid sekretai – compositions you would make after intentionally exploring the neighbourhood for the whole day, spotting and collecting field flowers (including the rare, very pretty ones, secretly stolen from the neighbour’s flower patch), interesting leaves, pieces of broken green bottle glass, stones you would pick up, and other small, precious keepsakes.

We would press the composition under a big piece of glass, thus enframing the memoirs of the summer play, and cover it with soil, thereby “burying“ it. Time, rain and decomposition would reshape the piece by the time you or someone else would rediscovere it.

The installation for Vilnius Light Festival is made of sekretai, a vitrage and the space in between them, connected by light, thus representing the beginning, the journey and the conclusion respectively.

It’s a visual invitation into a soft retrospection of our earthly journey – from the childhood self, to the present moment, which is co-habited by both versions of us, the young and the current.

The artwork reflects the joy of free play, unintentional exploring and temporality of the moment. This fragility is portrayed in the installation by the light rays which connect the vitrage and the sekretai.