Running While Filming, 2025

Hand made risography publication

This autoethnographic artistic research grew from a personal and political need to reflect on and give voice to my queer identity in Lithuania—a place where queer experiences are often marginalized or silenced. The work weaves together walking, writing, filming, and archival practices, exploring themes of gender identity, memory, embodiment, and resistance. Through intimate language and poetic gestures, I aim to create space for queer existence to be expressed authentically, vulnerably, and unapologetically. The idea emerged from lived experience—moving through everyday life as a queer person in a heteronormative culture. Each fragment of the work—letters, reflections, poetic texts, and visual materials—forms part of a larger narrative that resists fixed definitions and embraces emotional intensity, political urgency, and moments of tenderness. This project was first exhibited in Queer Archive and Gallery in Vilnius as part of Išgirsti, my first solo exhibition. A copy of the work is now housed in their archive, continuing to live as both testimony and trace. For me, this artistic research is not only an act of self-inquiry but also a refusal to disappear—a way of documenting, remembering, and resisting. I dedicate this work to queer people, to artists, and to anyone searching for a language for their love, pain, longing, and defiance. It is an invitation to witness and to feel—to be, breathe, and create, even when it’s uncomfortable or uncertain. Credits: Concept & texts: Rūta Grùma Text editing: Emilija Zak Publication graphic design: Laura Varžgalytė Logo design: Rūta Spelskytė Risograph printing: Titas Antanas Vilkaitis Binding: Julius Gaižauskas Funding & support: Aušra Volungė Griškonytė