Egidijus Koviera. Lost People

On May 14, 2026, at 5 p.m., a solo exhibition by Egidijus Koviera is opening at the Art Gallery of Vilnius University Šiauliai Academy (Vilniaus St. 141, Šiauliai). The exhibition will run until June 7, 2026. The gallery can be visited on Tuesday-Friday from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. and on Saturday, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.  

“Lost People” is a documentary photography project that has been lasting for more than two decades, capturing individuals who are experiencing homelessness or living on the verge of social exclusion. The project that began in Šiauliai eventually expanded beyond the borders of one city, reflecting situations from different regions of Lithuania and other countries as well as revealing that this social phenomenon is not local but recurs in various contexts.

The exhibition is presented as a sequence of nine individual stories. Every of them is created through a small collection of photographs, mostly portraits, in which a person looks directly at the camera or individuals are captured in their everyday environment filled with fragments of life – both open and unfinished. This is not documentation in the literal sense. This is the result of closeness. These personal trajectories are complemented by a broader exposition of photographs, capturing spaces, routines, and circumstances that shape these people’s everyday lives.

The project is unique in its method. The author does not act as a detached observer but maintains a long-term and close relationship with the people being photographed: he is constantly coming back to visit them, to talk to them. This relationship becomes an essential condition of the project. The images emerge from trust rather than interference.

Homelessness is often stereotypically viewed in society as an inevitable consequence of personal failure. This project questions such perception. Not through rhetoric or statistics, but through people’s faces and moments that invite us to pause and reconsider what we truly see when we look at another person.

The project does not put forward theses or propose solutions. Instead, it brings up questions that remain open:

When does life start slipping away? At which point do choices end and circumstances begin? Is it possible to truly “go back” and what does this mean? What does it mean to lose everything or to never have it? Do we really see or are we just looking? What remains when there is nothing left?

The project is still continuing today. Just like the invisible stories of these people.

About the author