Crossroads of Eastern Europe and the Arctic North – Artistic Personas and Creative Processes of Border-Crossing Artists

Abstract

This essay explores the development of an artistic persona and choices within the creative processes of border-crossing artists. Similar to the act of border crossing, the transcorporeal experience contains attempts to enter the unity of the body of the artist and the artwork with the socio-politics of the new site for artistic expression. In the action of border-crossing, artistic practice enters the holistic approach as the human, functioning in the new and unfamiliar society, and as the artist, thus continually shaping the individual’s artistic persona and artistic voice. The focus group data from the early-career border-crossing artists originating from Belarus and living in Lithuania are used alongside my autoethnographic data as a Lithuanian artist living in the Arctic North and the visual data from a middle-career artist from Lithuania living and working in the Nordic and Arctic North regions. This data was used for the reflexive analysis. The results outline the possible impact of border-crossing on artistic practice.