Carving Through Recovery: Embodied Healing, Sculpture, and the Ecology of Repair is a deeply personal and evolving project born from my journey of living with lupus. It explores how illness, ancestry and materiality come together through wood sculpture to reveal stories of resilience, memory, and transformation. In traditional Chinese medicine, bones are seen as vessels of ancestral memory—a powerful metaphor that guides my new work.
With this funding, I will focus on creating “Memory Is In Our Teeth,” a series of sculptural pieces carved from found branches, each telling a story of lineage, loss, and healing. I want to honour how our bodies carry history and how we can engage with this through the tactile, physical process of carving—transforming raw wood into vessels of care and reflection.
This bursary would give me the time and space to immerse myself in learning traditional woodcarving techniques and deepen my research into ancient healing practices and animist beliefs. I also plan to work with a mentor specialising in holistic and somatic approaches, helping me connect my lived experience of chronic illness with my creative process in a more embodied, healing way. The funding would also support studio rent, which I had to give up after my diagnosis last November, providing crucial financial support to regain a dedicated creative space.
For me, this project is about more than making sculpture—it is a way to reclaim my body, my history, and my artistic voice after the health challenges. This funding would be a lifeline, supporting my recovery and enabling me to rebuild a sustainable art practice rooted in care, connection and ecology.
Ultimately, “Memory Is In Our Teeth” aims to create art that holds space for personal and collective healing—offering others a chance to reconnect with their own stories of resilience and transformation. This award would be instrumental in bringing that vision to life, helping me transform my recovery into meaningful creative work that speaks to both body and spirit.
Carving Through Recovery: Embodied Healing, Sculpture, and the Ecology of Repair aligns closely with Darlington’s growing creative arts scene by emphasising healing, resilience, and ecological interconnectedness through art. By sharing my work in Darlington—through exhibitions, workshops and community collaborations—I hope to contribute to healing through art: a journey with found objects, a participatory series that invites reflection and connection through natural materials and ancient healing practices. My focus complements Darlington’s commitment to sustainability and wellbeing, offering a unique artistic perspective that bridges personal experience and environmental care. Receiving The Dover Prize would enable me to extend my practice’s reach into Darlington’s creative networks, enhancing the visibility of art that unites personal and planetary healing. In doing so, I aim to help raise the profile of creative arts in the area as a vital force for community resilience and ecological awareness.
Milda Lembertaitė’s playful work is an exploration of human interaction with nature, technology, and the often unseen yet intertwined histories of these relationships. Her art bridges the tactile physicality of sculptural forms that embodies an eco-activist sensibility enriched with a Dadaist spontaneity.
The incident in 2015, when a tree branch struck her head, symbolizes a profound, almost mystical connection with the non-human—a reminder of nature’s agency and its ability to interrupt, inspire, and communicate in unexpected ways. This seemingly random encounter turned into an artistic dialogue, where the fallen branch transformed from inert matter to a sculptural partner. Through pieces like these, Milda encourages a reimagining of objects typically seen as passive—wood, stone, bark—inviting them to become active participants in the narrative of human and ecological coexistence.
In her performances, screens become extensions of the body, blending physical presence with digital representation. The screen ceases to be a mere medium and transforms into a material that’s almost sculptural, heavy, and demanding, dragged and lifted in a way that reclaims its physicality. The performer’s exertion blurs the line between digital ‘immateriality’ and the sweat-drenched reality of human labor, grounding the digital image in the body’s visceral experiences.
Milda’s practice invites to view natural and technological objects as intertwined entities that share a “fate” with humans, where the boundaries between the animate and inanimate, human and non-human, begin to dissolve. This reflection on shared history and fate probes deep, often uncomfortable questions: how do we protect nature with tools that intrinsically harm it? And how can we reconcile the origins of these technologies with the landscapes they alter? Milda’s work is a call to remember our origins—not only as a species but as an interconnected web of beings, objects, and histories that bear witness to each other’s existence.
Milda holds an MA in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Art and a BA in Performance Design and Practice from Central Saint Martins, both in London. Selected exhibitions and residencies include: ARBOS, Lustwarande, Park De Oude Warande Tilburg (2024), Incantations, Editorial, Vilnius (2023), Primeval, Unit 1 Gallery, London (2023), Swiss Performance Art Award, Kunstmuseum Luzern (2022), Amada Verde, Haus am Lützowplatz, Berlin (2021), VOLUMES, Kunsthalle Zurich (2019), Can You Feel It?, Last Tango, Zurich (2019), Swiss Art Awards, Halle 4, Art Basel (2019), RA Lates: Transcendence, Royal Academy, London (2019), Hamza- Exodus To The Underground, Salon 61, ABA, Berlin (2019), LABVERDE, The Amazon, Brazil (2018), The Building Site, The London Festival Of Architecture, St. Paul’s Churchyard (2018), Tarzan Versus IBM, Mimosa House, London (2017), I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Ice Cream, Fondazione Baruchello, Rome (2017), Perímetro: Cine Expandido, Centro de Cultura Digital, Mexico City (2016), Che c’è di nuovo?, MASI, Lugano (2016), TATE Artists-in-Residence/ Schools Workshops (2015- 2016) and others.
Yes, MA in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Art and a BA in Performance Design and Practice from Central Saint Martins.
Develop Your Own Practice Grant (2018), AMEXID (2016), Lithuanian Culture (2023), Pro Helvetia (2019).
Yes, I actively organise self-created professional opportunities as a central part of my artistic practice. I am developing Carving Through Recovery: Embodied Healing, Sculpture, and the Ecology of Repair, a project that integrates sculpture, healing, and ecology through participatory workshops and community engagement. This initiative is deeply rooted in my personal journey with chronic illness and aims to create inclusive, supportive spaces where participants can explore resilience, connection, and wellbeing through creative expression.
I develop and lead artist-led workshops in collaboration with prestigious partners such as Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Serpentine Gallery and the Resolve Collective. These workshops focus on encouraging tactile, embodied creativity alongside reflection and dialogue.
Beyond workshops, I organise collaborative projects that extend the reach of my work and foster connections between art, performance, science, health, ritual and community. I manage all aspects of these initiatives, from conceptual development and outreach to logistics and facilitation.
Through these self-directed professional opportunities, I maintain creative autonomy and contribute meaningfully to the intersection of art and wellbeing, building a resilient practice grounded in personal experience and community engagement.
Yes, I have been commissioned by public institutions to create and present my work. Notably, I was invited to participate in the Swiss Art Award during Art Basel and Swiss Performance Art Award exhibition at the Kunstmuseum Luzern. This commission enabled me to showcase my sculptural and performance-based practice within a significant public museum context, engaging deeply with themes of ecology, memory, and transformation.
In 2024, I received my first outdoor sculpture commission with Lustwarande and Arbos in the Netherlands. This opportunity allowed me to extend my practice into public space, creating work that interacts with the natural environment and local communities.
Additionally, I have led artist-in-residence workshops at Tate Modern and Tate Britain in London. These workshops involved secondary school pupils and were designed to foster fresh perspectives on art and contemporary culture, encouraging meaningful dialogue between students and artists within prestigious gallery settings.
These commissions and residencies have been instrumental in broadening the reach of my work, enabling me to connect with diverse audiences and institutions while developing projects that intersect art, ecology, and healing.
Yes, my artworks have been acquired by both public and private collections.
New artwork acquired by Noewe Foundation: Give Yourself a New Life — Sculpture by Milda Lembertaitė
Exhibition Incantations by Milda Lembertaitė and Anna Ruth at Editorial — Echo Gone Wrong
Feature: Milda Lembertaitė and Anna Ruth at Editorial — Art Viewer
Artist profile: Milda Lembertaitė — Floorr Magazine
Exhibition by Milda Lembertaitė and Amelia Prazak at Chalton Gallery, London — Echo Gone Wrong
Participation in PLAY GROUND 4 — Tate
Featured in SUPER EDITION #5
Exhibition Che c’è di nuovo? — MASI, Lugano
Included in The Catlin Guide 2015: New Artists in the UK, curated by Justin Hammond
Review of MAstars on AxisWeb, by Paul Luckraft
Contribution to NAC Log No. 5: On Critical Tourism — Nida Art Colony Magazine
Essay: Gentrify Our Bodies: We Are Liquid Green Landscapes — The Good Neighbour
Exhibition Amada Verde at Haus am Lützowplatz, Berlin
Featured in Lost and Found, Paperwork Magazine, Issue 1
Participant in Labverde 2018 — Art Immersion Program in the Amazon
2019: DANCE 4 iC4C, B-ee-p Development, Nottingham, UK
Supported by Arts Council England
2018–19: Air Berlin Alexanderplatz, Berlin, Germany
Supported by Pro Helvetia
2018: LabVerde, The Amazon, Brazil
Supported by Lithuanian Culture Institute and Arts Council England
2016: Chalton Projects, Mexico
Supported by AMEXID and Arts Council England
2016: Hotel Maria Kapel, Hoorn, Netherlands
Supported by Mondrian Fund, Municipality of Hoorn, and The Pauwhof Fund
2015–16: Tate Modern and Tate Britain, Artists-in-Residence / Schools Workshops
2013: Nida Art Colony, Lithuania
Supported by Arts Council England and Pro Helvetia
2012: Art in Post Public Space, Tsarino Art Residency, Bulgaria
Email: milda.lembertaite@gmail.com
Address: 39a Thistlewaite Road, London, UK, E5 0QG, GB
Local Authority: Hackney Council
