Bio
STATEMENT
Monika Plioplyte’s work weaves together printed and cut paper, photographs, and other handmade elements into intricate narrative collages that explore memory, language, and fluid states of “in-betweenness” shaped by her immigrant experience. Drawing from Lithuanian Baltic folklore, female archetypes, personal rituals, and the uncanny, Plioplyte constructs textile-inspired patterns that become visual metaphors for the flow and exchange of information. These patterns echo the invisible forces - myths, memories, and language - that shape both personal narratives and collective identities.
Through multidisciplinary practice spanning printmaking, photography, performance, and installation, Plioplyte creates a personal pictorial interlanguage grounded in nature, folk symbolism, and her own body - simultaneously subject and object. Her work delves into the layered experience of inhabiting a human body, examining how our relationships with the earth and the other inform our sense of self, memory, and belonging. By fusing intimate stories with broader cultural frameworks, Plioplyte offers a compelling meditation on the porous boundaries between the personal and the universal.
BIO
Born in Lithuania, Monika Plioplyte immigrated to the US in her early teens. She holds an MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a BFA from Massachusetts College of Art and Design. Plioplyte has exhibited nationally at venues including the Hyde Park Art Center, Northern Illinois Art Museum, Monique Meloche, Columbia College Chicago, Boundary Space and Mana Contemporary in Illinois; Rare Visions in Colorado; Davis Center at Harvard University, AREA Gallery and Gallery Kayafas in Boston. Residencies include MASS MoCa, The Center Program at Hyde Park Art Center, the Harris Barron Fellowship for Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, and a Vermont Studio Center Fellowship. She has received grants from the Illinois Arts Council, the DCASE Individual Artists Program, the John W. Kurtich Foundation, and the Blanche E. Colman Foundation. Plioplyte lives and works in Chicago.