Raimonds Staprans is a well-known artist and playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

 both in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 and his native Latvia. Staprans was born in 1926 in Riga

Riga

Riga is the capital and largest city of Latvia. With 702,891 inhabitants Riga is the largest city of the Baltic states, one of the largest cities in Northern Europe and home to more than one third of Latvia's population. The city is an important seaport and a major industrial, commercial,...

, Latvia

Latvia

Latvia , officially the Republic of Latvia , is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by Estonia , to the south by Lithuania , to the east by the Russian Federation , to the southeast by Belarus and shares maritime borders to the west with Sweden...

. He now lives in San Francisco, California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

 with his wife, scientist Ilona Staprāns. He has two daughters, Maretta Staprans Barlow and Alda Staprans Mednis.

After living in occupied Latvia and in a Displaced Persons camp

Displaced persons camp

A displaced persons camp or DP camp is a temporary facility for displaced persons coerced into forced migration. The term is mainly used for camps established after World War II in West Germany and in Austria, as well as in the United Kingdom, primarily for refugees from Eastern Europe and for the...

 during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, Staprans immigrated to the United States with his family in 1947. He studied art at the University of Washington

University of Washington

University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...

 under Alexander Archipenko

Alexander Archipenko

Alexander Porfyrovych Archipenko was a Ukrainian avant-garde artist, sculptor, and graphic artist.-Biography:...

 and Mark Tobey

Mark Tobey

Mark George Tobey was an American abstract expressionist painter, born in Centerville, Wisconsin. Widely recognized throughout the United States and Europe, Tobey is the most noted among the "mystical painters of the Northwest." Senior in age and experience, Tobey had a strong influence on the...

, then moved to the San Francisco Bay Area to begin graduate studies at the University of California, Berkeley

University of California, Berkeley

The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...

. He studied with Hans Hofmann

Hans Hofmann

Hans Hofmann was a German-born American abstract expressionist painter.-Biography:Hofmann was born in Weißenburg, Bavaria on March 21, 1880, the son of Theodor and Franziska Hofmann. When he was six he moved with his family to Munich...

 and Karl Kasten

Karl Kasten

Karl Albert Kasten was a painter-printmaker-educator in the San Francisco Bay Area.- Early life :Kasten, fourth child of Ferdinand Kasten and his wife Barbara Anna Kasten, grew up in San Francisco's Richmond District not far from the peacocks at Golden Gate Park...

, among others, and graduated with a Masters of Fine Arts in 1954. Staprans began exhibiting his art in the Maxwell Galleries in San Francisco. He currently exhibits at the Hackett | Mill Gallery in San Francisco and at the Peter Mendenhall Gallery in Los Angeles

Los Ángeles

Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

.

Staprans' work is held in the permanent collections in the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, comprising the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum in Golden Gate Park and the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park, is the largest public arts institution in the city of San Francisco and one of the largest art museums in California.-External...

, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Los Angeles County Museum of Art

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art is an art museum in Los Angeles, California. It is located on Wilshire Boulevard along Museum Row in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles, adjacent to the George C. Page Museum and La Brea Tar Pits....

, the San Jose Museum of Art

San Jose Museum of Art

The San Jose Museum of Art is an art museum in Downtown San Jose, California, USA. Founded in 1969, the museum hosts a large permanent collection emphasizing West Coast artists of the 20th- and 21st-century. It is located next to the Circle of Palms Plaza and Plaza de César Chávez...

, and the Portland Art Museum

Portland Art Museum

The Portland Art Museum in Portland, Oregon, United States, was founded in 1892, making it the oldest art museum on the West Coast and seventh oldest in the United States. Upon completion of the most recent renovations, the Portland Art Museum became one of the twenty-five largest art museums in...

, among others. A career retrospective of his art opened at the Pasadena Museum of California Art in March, 2006, was shown at the Hackett-Freedman Gallery and traveled to Riga, Latvia where it was exhibited in the Latvian National Museum of Art later that year.

Staprans' skillfully constructed still life and landscape paintings are notable for the artist's sensitive response to light and color. A recent review of his work exhibited in Los Angeles compared the "tasteful seriousness" of his paintings to that of Cézanne

Paul Cézanne

Paul Cézanne was a French artist and Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th century conception of artistic endeavour to a new and radically different world of art in the 20th century. Cézanne can be said to form the bridge between late 19th...

. Staprans is said to examine the "architecture" of everyday objects in his art using explosive color and flattened compositions, creating a "tension between representation and abstraction that plays with viewers' expectations."

Staprans is also an accomplished playwright. Most of his plays are set in Latvia during the 20th century. His play "The Freezing" was produced in 1979 by the San Francisco Little Theater and the Latvian National Theater in 1980. His 1989 play, "Four Days in June", depicted the Soviet occupation of Latvia in 1940

Soviet occupation of Latvia in 1940

The Soviet occupation of Latvia in 1940 refers, according to the European Court of Human Rights, the Government of Latvia, the State Department of the United States of America, and the European Union, to the military occupation of the Republic of Latvia by the Soviet Union ostensibly under the...

. It was performed in Riga to more than 100 sold-out audiences, and later won first prize in the Baltic Theatre Festival. "Four Days in June" is regarded as having played an integral part in the pro-democracy movement in Latvia during the momentous changes following the end of the Soviet Union

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

.

In 2003, Staprans was awarded Latvia's highest civilian honor, the Order of the Three Stars

Order of the Three Stars

Order of the Three Stars is order awarded for merits in service for Latvia. It was established in 1924 in remembrance of founding of Latvia. Its motto is "Per aspera ad astra"...

, the Latvian equivalent of the United States Presidential Medal of Freedom

Presidential Medal of Freedom

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is an award bestowed by the President of the United States and is—along with thecomparable Congressional Gold Medal bestowed by an act of U.S. Congress—the highest civilian award in the United States...

.

An extensive interview with Raimonds Staprans was conducted by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution

Smithsonian Institution

The Smithsonian Institution is an educational and research institute and associated museum complex, administered and funded by the government of the United States and by funds from its endowment, contributions, and profits from its retail operations, concessions, licensing activities, and magazines...

, by Paul Karlstrom in 1997. Karlstrom later published a fully illustrated book entitled "Raimonds Staprans: Art of Tranquility and Turbulence".

Further reading

• Ansone, Elita. Way Too Many Unruly Oranges, Diena, December 5, 2003
• Avens, Voldemars. About the Painter Raimonds Staprans, Jauna Gaita 216 March, 1999
• Karlstrom, Paul J. "Control and Sensuality: The Realist Abstraction of Raimonds Staprans" in Raimonds Staprans: Recent Work. Catalogue. San Francisco, California: Hackett-Freedman Gallery, 2001.
• Landauer, Susan, William H. Gerdts, and Patricia Trenton. The Not-So-Still-Life: A Century of California Painting and Sculpture Berkeley: University of California Press and San Jose, California: San Jose Museum of Art, 2003.
• Landauer, Susan. The Lighter Side of Bay Area Figuration Kansas City: Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, 2000.
• Mendenhall, Peter. Raimonds Staprans Pasadena, California: Mendenhall Gallery, 1998.

Selected exhibitions

• April 2011 Hackett Mill Gallery, San Francisco
• March, 2009 Hackett-Freedman Gallery, San Francisco
• 2008 Peter Mendenhall Gallery, Los Angeles;
• 2006 State Museum of Art, Riga, Latvia; Hackett-Freedman Gallery, San Francisco; Pasadena Museum of California Art, Pasadena;
• 2003-2004 Hackett-Freedman Gallery, San Francisco;
• 2001 Hackett-Freedman Gallery, San Francisco;
• 1999 Mendenhall Gallery, Beverly Hills;
• 1998 Maxwell Galleries, San Francisco;
• 1997 Kunstmesse, Cologne; Galerie Redmann, Berlin; Mendenhall Gallery, Pasadena;
• 1996 Maxwell Galleries, San Francisco; Mendenhall Gallery, Pasadena;
• 1994 Marburg Art Center, Marburg, Germany; Galerie Redmann, Berlin; Maxwell Galleries, San Francisco;
• 1993 Galerie Redmann, Berlin.