^{August Kunnapu exhibition “Joys of Summer”}

Jūrmala’s exhibition venues offer a diverse programme of art and culture throughout the year. They present both contemporary art exhibitions and displays that highlight the history of the resort town and the stories of notable personalities. The exhibition venues are located in historic wooden buildings, structures built in the second half of the 20th century, and in an example of post-war modernist architecture – Dubulti Art Station. Jūrmala’s museums and galleries regularly host both Latvian and international artists. Together, they form a dynamic cultural space with a broad perspective on artistic processes and the city’s identity.

Jūrmala Museum (Tirgoņu iela 29, Majori)

• “My Sea” (27.05–28.06) – a solo exhibition by the dedicated seascape photographer Jevgenijs Pugins, presented in the Fireplace Hall of Jūrmala Museum, where the sea is revealed as a changing, multilayered and emotionally charged landscape. The artist’s photographs are characterised by calm restraint, aesthetic balance and a subtle sense of atmosphere, allowing viewers to experience the sea in different seasons, moods and coastal locations – from Jūrmala to Liepāja, Ventspils and Saulkrasti. The exhibition also pays special attention to disappearing traces of coastal life, including old wooden fishing boats that once formed an organic part of the seaside landscape. The photographs combine the artist’s personal experience of long-term observation of the sea with respect for Latvia’s marine art tradition and the artists whom Jevgenijs Pugins considers his teachers and kindred spirits.

• “Meeting in the Milky Way Galaxy – Art in Glass” (24.04–28.06) – an exhibition at Jūrmala Museum inviting visitors to discover glass art as a fragile, multilayered and surprisingly expressive medium. The inspiration for the exhibition is Ķemeri School – an important architectural monument of the 1930s, whose interior features a ceiling painting depicting the Milky Way. The exhibition brings together artists of different generations, united by the materiality of glass, a poetic sense of space and a dialogue with cultural heritage. Alongside installations by Inguna Audere and Michael Rogers, the exhibition also features the contemporary glass art collection “The Feeling of Glass” from the Līvāni Glass and Craft Centre, revealing the diversity of glass art and craftsmanship in Latvia.

• The audiovisual space “A Holidaymaker on the Way to Jūrmala” (until 14.02.2027) – an exhibition that invites visitors to experience the emotionally charged journey to the resort town across different eras – from horse-drawn carriages and steamboats to railway travel. Through sound, image and spatial scenography, the exhibition allows visitors to immerse themselves in the atmosphere of a historic journey and, through sensory experience, encounter the long-awaited sea.

Jūrmala Cultural Centre (Jomas iela 35, Majori)

• Ērika Kumerova’s exhibition “SL’OTAS MANIFESTS” (until 30.06) – a painting exhibition in which the artist explores an experiment with an unusual tool – a broom – using the dynamics, movement and multilayered quality of the brushstroke it creates. In the works, the landscape appears as something only barely suggested – a space formed by abstract fields of colour and lines, where the viewer’s imagination plays an essential role. The exhibition features works in oil and acrylic, most of them created in 2025 and 2026, combining Ērika Kumerova’s characteristic richness of colour, painterly lightness and bold experimentation with form. “SL’OTAS MANIFESTS” is an invitation to think of painting as a living, changing and physical process.

Bulduri Exhibition House (Muižas iela 6, Bulduri)

• “From Jūrmala to Ruhnu Island. Painter Voldemārs Caune – 125” (06.05–05.07) – an exhibition dedicated to the anniversary of the outstanding Latvian figurative painter Voldemārs Caune, highlighting coastal landscapes, fishermen’s lives and the world of the people living along the Baltic Sea coast in his work. The exhibition presents works from the 1930s to the 1960s – views of Jūrmala’s nature, images of fishermen, landscapes of Ruhnu Island and portraits of its inhabitants. It reveals the artist’s ability to capture coastal everyday life, human character and the mood of the era with psychological nuance. The exhibition also includes the figurative composition “Ancient Music. The Musicians of Alsunga” (1940), which symbolically marks changes in the artist’s life and in the historical context of the time.
• Visitors also have the opportunity to look into the studio and creative world of Jūrmala’s art legend Valdis Bušs (1924–2014), one of the most outstanding Latvian landscape painters of his time.

Aspazija House (Z. Meierovica prospekts 18/20, Dubulti)

• “A Woman’s Companion – the Handbag” (28.05–19.09) – an exhibition at Aspazija House that reveals the handbag as a practical, aesthetic and era-defining companion of women. The display features handbags from the 1880s to the period of the Second World War, made of silk, leather, silver, metal and other materials. The exhibition brings together objects from the collections of 12 Latvian museums and 27 private collections, including handbags that belonged to notable Latvian cultural figures – Elvīra Bramberga, Dace Akmentiņa, Emīlija Bērziņa, Elfrīda Pakule and Anna Brigadere.

Dubulti Art Station (Zigfrīda Meierovica prospekts 4, Dubulti)

• Gļebs Panteļejevs’ exhibition “Monuments” (12.06–02.09) – a solo exhibition by the Latvian sculptor, in which the artist turns to questions of freedom, moral values and human inner responsibility. Gļebs Panteļejevs is one of the most significant figures in Latvian contemporary and monumental sculpture, whose works honour personalities, historical memory and principles important to society. In the exhibition “Monuments”, the artist reflects on the mobility of the soul and the fragility of freedom at a time when a person may become complicit in their own lack of freedom. Panteļejevs’ sculpture is characterised by classical mastery of form, modernist generalisation and the ability to transform monumental themes into a personal, emotionally charged experience.

Jūrmala Culture Space and Environmental Design Centre (Pils iela 1, Dubulti)

• “CHARISMA” (10.04–30.06) – a solo exhibition by painter Jānis Ferdinands Tīdemanis, offering a first opportunity in Jūrmala to encounter one of the most vivid artistic voices in Latvian modernism. At the centre of the exhibition are women, flowers, touches of light and charisma – elements that run through the artist’s works and reveal his distinctive view of beauty and the vitality of life. The exhibition brings together works from the Rietumu Banka art collection, as well as important pieces from the Esterkins family collection and Zuzeum, offering a rare opportunity to experience the diversity and emotional intensity of Tīdemanis’ oeuvre in one place.

Gallery Bastejs (Skultes iela 10, Priedaine)

• Ritums Ivanovs’ exhibition “ON PAPER” and August Kunnapu’s exhibition “Joys of Summer” (from 06.06) – two new exhibitions at Gallery Bastejs, on view from 6 June. Ritums Ivanovs is known in Latvian art for his expressive exploration of the human figure and portrait, while the exhibition “ON PAPER” focuses on works created on paper. The exhibition “Joys of Summer” by Estonian artist August Kunnapu introduces visitors to the artist’s colourful and recognisable visual language through a selection of works inspired by the mood of summer.