The Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies is pleased to announce that Sniedze Kāle has been awarded the 2025-2026 Aina Birnitis Dissertation-Completion Fellowship in the Humanities for Latvia.
The Aina Birnitis Scholarship supports a year of research and writing to help advanced graduate students in the humanities in the last year of Ph.D. dissertation writing. The fellowship provides a $21,000 stipend for one year plus $1,000 for university fees.
The fellowship is supported by a bequest of Aina Birnitis, a librarian by profession living in Carlton, a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
The 2025 applications were evaluated by the AABS 2025-2026 Grants and Awards Committee consisting of AABS VP for Professional Development Dr. Kaarel Piirimäe, AABS President Dr. Jörg Hackmann, and AABS Director-at-Large Dr. Dovilė Budrytė. AABS President-Elect Dr. Daina Eglitis served as an additional panel member for the Birnitis Fellowship. Learn about the other 2025-2026 recipients here.
Sniedze Kāle is a Latvian art historian, producer, and curator. As a research assistant at the Institute of Art History of the Art Academy of Latvia, she is specializing in leftist art of the interwar period in Latvia and activities of Latvian artists in the Soviet Union by 1937. With a strong interest in 20th- and 21st-century art, she has curated numerous exhibitions and has some experience in art criticism, publishing primarily in Latvian journals and magazines. Kāle is currently completing her PhD thesis, Latvian Artist Groupings in the Soviet Union (1917–1937), and has participated in international conferences and academic collaborations. She is a board member of the Latvian Society of Art Historians and Curators and the Latvian Animation Association, where she participates as an animated film producer.
Project Overview: Latvian Artist Groupings in Soviet Russia (1917–1937)
Kāle’s thesis explores the experiences of Latvian émigré artists in Soviet Russia from 1917 to 1937, many of whom remained in the USSR and found themselves caught between two identities—seen as “foreign” in Soviet Russia and “disloyal” in Latvia. The Great Terror led to their unjust persecution, erasing many names from cultural memory. The study examines national identity, ideological loyalty, and artistic expression within diaspora groupings such as the Latvian Riflemen’s Young Artists Circle Daile and the Prometejs Fine Arts sub-section. Using historical, biographical, iconographic, and sociological methods, it traces creative responses to repression and ideological pressure. Kāle’s aim is to restore the legacy of this overlooked community and highlight the contribution of its members to both the radical avant-garde and Socialist Realism. The thesis also reflects on the relevance of this history in the light of contemporary political aggression, emphasizing the need for an unbiased interpretation of art history.