Janis KALMITE
1906–1996, Latvia

Jānis Kalmīte (1907-1996) was an expressionist painter and among the best-known artists in the Latvian post-World War II diaspora community. His name is associated with the development of a singular theme – the rija. Rijas, or threshing barns, were historically among the oldest structures on the traditional Latvian homestead. Throughout his half-century of exile from Latvia, Kalmīte transformed the rija into an artistic symbol for the persistence of Latvian ethnic culture in the face of invasion and occupation by foreign powers...

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