Healthy Friends

HEALTHY FRIENDS Jānis Dzirnieks solo show Healthy Friends Curated by Kaspars Groševs Kim? Contemporary Art Centre presents Jānis Dzirnieks’ second solo exhibition at the institution, following the artist’s two-month residency at ISCP, New York in the autumn of 2024, as the recipient of the Kim? Residency Award. In New York, small corner stores — bodegas — can be found on almost every block. One such store, called Healthy Friends, offers sandwiches and fast food that are far from anything actually healthy. Yet the names of these establishments often include words like healthy, natural, organic, and other slogans praising naturalness — phrases that serve no purpose beyond drawing attention to a product range oversaturated with chemicals. The works in the exhibition include scanned scribbles and watercolor drawings, later digitally enhanced, printed, and then physically modified. These drawings depict various creatures in stages of decay and decomposition, merged with illustrations of refrigeration system optimizations. In a way, the process of decay can be seen as a form of optimization — much like the creation of these works could be viewed as a kind of self-reprocessing. Optimization, as such, is inevitable in both living and non-living organisms, as well as in economics, politics, sociology, and beyond. The prevailing high level of distrust in bodegas — from overpriced trivialities to the tastiest snacks — serves as a fitting metaphor for Dzirnieks’ reflections on themes of technological efficiency and environmental degradation, which are explored within the exhibition through elements of spatial installation and other objects created specifically for the show. Jānis Dzirnieks’ (1992) work cuts through the facade of technological efficiency, revealing the unsettling and often sinister forms that emerge from our relentless drive for optimization. By repurposing industrial remnants into thought-provoking installations, Dzirnieks prompts viewers to confront the ecological and societal costs of progress. Solo exhibitions include: Tiled River at Gallery 427, Riga; Flat Tire at Robert Fruinstraat 56, Rotterdam; Gaidot nākamo minūti at Kim? Contemporary Art Centre, Riga; and Sharp Horizon at Nemo, Eckernförde. Duo exhibitions include: Snowlake Blockbuster (with Alise Anna Dzirniece) at Extra City, Antwerp. Group exhibitions: Soap Opera at City Surfer Office, Prague; Agents of Perception at Kai Art Center, Tallinn; Midnight Sunburn at Het Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam; and others. He is the recipient of the 2024 Kim? Contemporary Art Centre Residency Award and undertook a residency at ISCP, New York. *** 5% Discount on Tuesdays H: Hello! I got a juice here in the morning and some of the contents are missing. F: Not my problem. H: I insist on receiving the missing part – or at least part of the part. F: The world is open – the fridge is right there, next to the heart. H: But why are there cigarette butts in my part of the juice? When I came here to shop in the morning, the bottle contained 12% juice, now at least 3% is ash and tar… F: Add some more and the bottle will be full. H: Not funny! I demand my part of the juice! F: Today we have a 5% discount on Hematogen bars! Only on Tuesdays! H: Do I look anaemic? Is this a cruel joke? F: Words no longer mean anything these days, like images they are washed out by endless sea foam, leaving the remains of the ship stranded on the beach like leisurely mermaids… H: I sometimes wonder whether I smoke too much, complain too much… The door to the fridge is locked! F: It can only be opened from inside – you have to ask the juice itself to come out. * The sound of Citi Zēni fills the space * F: The radio isn’t what it used to be. H: Have the methods changed? I don't think the liver is too close, a good 80 steps! I sometimes think I am made up of juice. I drink it so often my skin has acquired an orange tint. F: Meanwhile I sometimes think it might be easier to shut this shop down. I see all of you in my nightmares, endless requests for your half, but why is there still VAT on top of it all? H: I have a Jim Morrison record at home, you know… Without its sleeve, but the record is amazing, I promise! F: Today we have a security guard who, it would seem, has no bath at home. H: Wasn’t I here yesterday? F: Yesterday there was no 5% discount – you should know that! H: I was here! I bought semolina and cigarettes! F: You all look the same to me – you are like exhibition texts! Every time I turn right, I find myself at the start – it will never end! All of you worms are just crawling in here and you multiply instead of dispersing! H: It will only end once. F: I have a headache, I can’t go home, I am trapped between curd snacks and soap. Soap that the security guard, by the way, doesn't have! Please open the respiratory organs! H: You know what, I’ve changed my mind! I don't want the other half of the juice – I would like some dopamine. And vitamin D. F: And I would like to be a fridge that opens from the inside. H: You already are! Even in Paris I didn’t experience such poor service … F: When I was 27, I dreamt of never-ending love, but instead I am jabbed in my heart again and again. And you know what? These jabs are ornamented – my heart has turned into a mitten! Late in the evenings I sit in the Père Lachaise Cemetery, smoke and cannot stop thinking about the patterns that pop up everywhere I look. This body is cursed! H: You remind me of someone… F: I was told to follow the thread. I was told to behave. I was told everything would be fine, but everything ends only once. H: What did you do in July? F: (mockingly) Wat did yoo doo in July, meh… H: Why are you suddenly being like this? Life is full of surprises. F: Perhaps. H: Your fridge is off – the juice won't be cold enough! It might even have gone bad! How is this possible? F: The fridge has returned to homeostasis. It is all about us… H: The farther we go, the more difficult it becomes to escape from the labyrinth. And at the centre is my juice! F: It has long since evaporated – the iron eyes and nickel horns have melted it. One day they will also melt me – I cannot wait. Otherwise the vulture shows no sign of coming. And the chemist is closed already, no chance of getting ibuprofen. H: By the way, have you heard about elastolysis? F: And have you heard about the end of the workday? We’re closing in 15 minutes! H: What will happen when this flesh falls apart? Have you thought about that? F: I don't think, I act. H: Can you see the grid above us? It seems I can distinguish Venus. F: It's merely the lack of fresh air… Perhaps you can invent your half of the contents of the bottle and get lost at last? H: But what about the cigarette butt? Who will take responsibility for this? F: “And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.” H: Alright, I got it, you're not in a good mood. F: Exactly! Five minutes! H: Will I be able to leave through the same passage I used to enter if I don't get what I desire? F: Only the emergency exit is prohibited for you – the nostrils. H: As I said, life is full of surprises. F: Just like this body! Did you finally find what you were looking for? H: I came unarmed, I pretended to be better than I actually am. I was a beggar but I will leave as a discoverer, since I’ve found cheese with fenugreek seeds on sale! Have you ever seen fenugreek? Exactly, neither have I – does it even exist and where does it grow? Are Colorado beetles fond of it? I often whirl around while standing still, I only look straight ahead, only ahead and I don't see beyond the tentacles. What could it mean? F: You should spend less time on your phone! (calling out) Yuri, do you have the keys? (whispering) And a bath? H: When this body was born, I did not yet exist. When the shop was set up here, I lived on the other bank. Will I still be here, when this shop is replaced by a building with lofts? I sometimes wonder if I am not in several places at the same time, surfing on tectonic plates as a blonde god in fresh underwear or like a bottle of sparkling non-alcoholic gin in an advertisement on the end wall of a building. When I learned to speak, at first I only wanted to bark. At passers-by, at classmates, at whoever. Do you know how to bark? F: Do you know how to read? Open until 10… H: I like to linger in the time before the plague, when this place was open until 11. F: And I like to watch the telly at home. Goodbye! H: Wait! F: Yes? H: Has anyone told you that you look like Jim Morrison? F: Goodbye, I said!