Agnė Jokšė Dear Friend, 2019, Single channel video, 24:17 mins
Courtesy of the Artist.
Selected by Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius

Dear friend is a video by Lithuanian artist Agnė Jokšė. Performed by the artist and based on a letter-form text written in contemplation of friendship as platonic love between queer women, the work openly and sensitively speaks about various forms of love, affection and care in the contemporary world.

Artist Q&A

Where are you from and how did you become interested in moving image work?
I grew up in Vilnius, Lithuania. My main practice is writing, however, as a reader I’ve always been more curious about the sense lived through the text, the unsaid or somehow by words and their agreed meanings - untellable. Moving image, as a medium, carries multidimensionality of elements that can contain layers and layers of information. It’s exciting, like finding a treasure - a box full of all kinds of tools to come closer and explore the space in between the lines.

What inspired/influenced you to make the work?
The passion for friends.

What are you working on at the moment?
Currently I’m working on a video work called Unconditional Love which is an ongoing inquiry into entangled cross-generational family relations and their role in the claim of kinship.

Agnė Jokšė (b. 1993) is currently based in Copenhagen, studying for a Master’s degree at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, School of Media Arts. In 2017, Jokšė graduated from Vilnius Academy of Arts, Department of Monumental Painting and Stage Design. Since 2018 she actively participates in various art projects. The work Dear Friend was produced by the Contemporary Art Centre in Vilnius and won the JCDecaux Award in 2019.