3812: Your works stage an imagined dialogue charged with tension, where implicit emotions gradually surface through deep reflection and retrospection. What kinds of elusive or unspoken emotions do you seek to encode within your imagery? What artistic techniques or visual strategies do you employ to construct these layered narratives?
Māris Čačka: I am interested in emotions that are difficult to verbalise — states of inner tension, distance, silence, expectation and fragile moments of human connection. These are not dramatic or illustrative emotions; rather, they exist beneath the visible surface and often remain unresolved. In my paintings, I try to create an atmosphere where these emotional states can gradually emerge through the viewer’s reflection and sensitivity.
My process is based on layering and gradual transformation. I work with multiple transparent and opaque layers of acrylic paint, often repeatedly adding and removing material. This creates a visual memory within the surface of the painting itself. Elements of painting and graphic language coexist within one structure — gestures, scratches, traces, and fragments of erased forms. I am interested in how a painting can preserve time, hesitation and correction. The final image is never a direct statement, but rather the result of accumulated visual decisions and emotional sediment.
3812: Your art can be perceived almost as a personal journal of encounters, memories and reflections, unfolding through enigmatic brushwork and tonalities that reveal themselves layer by layer. To what extent do personal experiences shape the emotional rhythms and compositional structures within your paintings? Are there any particularly memorable encounters or moments that have left a lasting imprint on your canvas?
Māris: Personal experience is deeply present in my work, although not in a direct or narrative form. I do not paint specific events or portraits of people, yet many works originate from encounters, conversations, emotional impressions or introspective moments that continue to resonate internally over time. Painting becomes a visual diary — not documenting reality directly, but preserving emotional and psychological traces.
Some encounters remain with me for years and later reappear in the atmosphere of a painting. It may be a conversation, a silence, a landscape, or the presence of a person. My “Direct Dialogues” and “Satellites” series are connected to this idea of invisible relationships and emotional orbits between people. These experiences shape not only the emotional rhythm of the work, but also its structure — pauses, density, openness, fragmentation and balance emerge intuitively from inner experience.
3812: Your paintings often appear suspended between concealment and revelation, where cloudy tonalities and layered surfaces gradually give way to subtle luminosity. What draws you to this language of obscurity, and what kind of emotional or philosophical space do you hope viewers enter through it?
Māris: I believe ambiguity creates space for deeper emotional participation. I am not interested in offering fixed meanings or direct narratives. Obscurity, for me, is not about hiding information, but about preserving openness and sensitivity. Contemporary life surrounds us with excessive clarity, speed and the constant need for explanation, whereas painting offers a different tempo — slower, quieter and more reflective.
The layered tonalities and restrained luminosity in my work emerge from a desire to create an inner psychological space rather than an external image. I hope viewers enter a state of concentrated silence, where perception becomes more intuitive and less analytical. These paintings are invitations to remain within uncertainty for a moment, allowing emotional associations and personal memories to gradually emerge.
3812: There is a restrained stillness and contemplative rhythm within your works that feels both intimate and expansive. To what extent are your paintings shaped by Northern European sensibilities, memory or landscape, and how do you see silence functioning within your artistic vocabulary?
Māris: I think Northern European sensibility inevitably shapes my visual language. The atmosphere of the Baltic region — its restrained light, seasonal rhythms, long winters, fog, forests and emotional reserve — forms an important psychological background for my work. Even when my paintings are entirely abstract, they carry traces of this environment through colour, rhythm and spatial sensation.
Silence plays a central role in my artistic vocabulary. I do not perceive silence as emptiness, but rather as a form of concentration and presence. In painting, silence can manifest through restrained gesture, subtle tonal transitions and suspended spatial relationships. I am interested in creating works that do not overwhelm the viewer, but instead invite slower observation and inner dialogue. In many ways, silence becomes a material in itself — an element that structures the emotional architecture of the painting.
3812: As both an artist and the director of the Rothko Museum, how do you balance institutional leadership and personal artistic practice? Do these two roles ever come into tension, or do they continuously nourish one another?
Māris: Balancing these two roles is both challenging and enriching. Institutional work requires responsibility, strategic thinking, communication and constant involvement in practical processes, while artistic practice demands solitude, introspection and emotional openness. Naturally, tensions arise at times, especially regarding time and mental focus.
At the same time, both roles continuously enrich one another. Working within an international museum environment allows me to engage deeply with contemporary artistic processes, curatorial thinking and dialogue between artists and audiences. This environment keeps me intellectually active and critically aware. Meanwhile, my personal artistic practice helps preserve sensitivity and authenticity within institutional leadership. I believe it is important for a museum director to remain connected to the creative process itself, not only administration.
3812: Leading an institution so deeply connected to Mark Rothko and the legacy of abstraction must inevitably shape one’s perception of painting. How has your directorship at the Rothko Museum influenced your own visual language, emotional atmosphere, or understanding of abstraction over the years?
Māris: Working within the context of the Rothko Museum has undoubtedly deepened my understanding of abstraction — not only as a visual language, but also as an emotional and philosophical condition. Rothko’s works demonstrate how painting can communicate through atmosphere, rhythm, silence and emotional intensity without relying on narrative. This has given me a deeper confidence in abstraction’s ability to create a highly personal yet universal experience.
At the same time, I consciously avoid creating direct stylistic parallels with Rothko. I am more interested in the quality of thought itself — concentration, emotional precision, spatiality and the significance of silence within painting. Daily work with international exhibitions, artists and curators constantly expands my understanding of how diverse and alive abstraction can remain today.
3812: How do you feel about being represented by 3812 Gallery following your longstanding professional connection with the gallery’s co-founder, Calvin Hui? Having collaborated with him primarily in an institutional context over the years, how does it feel to now enter a different type of dialogue — as the artist at the centre of a solo exhibition?
Māris: This collaboration feels both very organic and an important new stage for me. Calvin and I share a longstanding professional dialogue that initially developed within an institutional and curatorial context. Over the years, I have greatly appreciated his ability to create thoughtful exhibitions and to approach art through an intercultural and international perspective.
Now this dialogue moves into a different level — much more personal and vulnerable. Being at the centre of an exhibition as an artist means opening one’s visual and emotional world in another way. At the same time, I feel strong trust and professional understanding from the gallery. It is important to me that this exhibition is not merely a presentation of works, but also a conversation about abstraction, silence, perception and emotional presence within contemporary painting.
