Poster artists and Their Output: From Interwar Latvia to Exile in the West

Participation in the AABS (Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies) conference “Diasporas: Building Bridges Across Nations” with a presentation titled “Poster Artists and Their Output: From Interwar Latvia to Exile in the West” was based on research into the poster collection of the Art Academy of Latvia. At the conference at the University of Illinoisin Urbana-Champaign (28–30 May, 2026), several of Latvia’s most significant poster artists (Niklāvs Strunke, Sigismunds Vidbergs, Eduards Dzenis, Alfrēds Švedrēvics) were presented, whose early creative work is associated with the period of the Republic of Latvia (1918–1940) – an important prelude to the flourishing of poster art during the Sovietoccupation. The conference provided an opportunity to establish contacts with Baltic researchers from other countries, discuss the ambiguous legacy of the occupation period, and generate new ideas for achieving theproject’s scientific goals.