Dom is Dom

Dominyka Obelenyte is Lithuanian-born romanticist, 10 x Brazilian jiu jitsu world champion and mixed media visual artist, situated in Sacramento, California. Dom studied visual arts at Columbia University, where she discovered her love of printmaking, and cannibalizing paper works into new creations.

“I wasn’t allowed out of my house as a kid and teenager, but the walls were adorned with large photographs of mystical places that I knew existed but had never visited before. Those places were an antithesis to the suffocating barriers of my world: smooth rolling lines to break through four square walls. Vivid hues to push past boring beiges. Leafed organisms expanding limitlessly outwards instead of curling inside of themselves. 

The four walls imprinted on me the idea that form should be labeled and processed-made easy to digest. That 90 degree angles constituted structure, and the fabric of the tall, sturdy and gray offered real opportunity and real wealth.

My art is a world where impish creatures thrive, and consciousness can run hand in hand with itself, delighting in the diversity of life and observable experience. Each world is a world in which old memories embed new observations, shapes reflect on our ancestors, and color rules the kingdom with a tender hand.”