Vitality And Change In Lithuanian Photography

Vitality and Change in Lithuanian PhotographyFeb. 17 to March 19 , 1995 , Gah lberg Gallery, Arts Center

Vitality and Change inLithuanian PhotographyBrothers CerniauskaiAleksandrds MacijauskasMiche1keviciuteRomllaldas PozerskisRomualdas RakauskasVaclovas StraukasAntanus SlltkusYleviciusI would like to thank AlgimantasKezys for his invaluable help andsupport in assembling the works forthis fine exhibit. I would also like tothank Leah Oilman for her incisiveessay, and Father Michael Komechakand Adrienne Delaquila for their exper tise and enthusiasm for the projectEileen BroidoDirector and CuratorGahlberg Gallery, Arts CenterCollege of DuPage22nd Street and Park BoulevardGlen Ellyn, IL 60137-6599(708) 858-2800, ext. 2321This exhibit was organized in con junction with "Transition and Changein Eastern Europe, An IllinoisPerspective," a yearlong series ofevents devoted to examiningchanges in Eastern Europe withmajor funding by The IllinoisHumanities Council.It has been made possible, in part,by a grant from The Illinois ArtsCouncil, a state agency; The IllinoisHumanities Council; The NationalEndowment for the Humanities; andthe Illinois General Assembly.Front Cover: Untitled, ATLAIDAl/LlthuanianPilgrimages series, Romualdas Pozerskis

On Lithuanian Photography. A Historical Eventr . Jll3l1 Kt"Z}Lithwnian ph rogtaph 'daguerreotype p . . -r Ruin rhe rear 1 5.o.! when thecame [0 Un.ius fr mWar aw. e rring up h ' mill on \' kie ·u treet. By 1863 sev eral studio wer operating in me ci ' of\'iloius. including thatof Sveikoyskis, kno\\-n for h· portrai and ·c oe of the cityof Vilnius. Abdonas Lorzunas' at LiercJo eel b) rder of theRussian General X!\rL Mura\-joy fo r producing d umen taryportraits of the freedom fighters w h fought in the 1863uprising against the Russian occupation of L thuania.The por traits found in his studio were destroyed . and Lorzunas wasdeported. By end of the 19th century, more and more studiOphotographers started moving outdoors, photOgraphing theLithuanian landscapes and cityscapes.]. Cechovicius was thefirst to mass-produce and commercially distribute photographsof the city of Vilnius, while S. FIeri is credited with pioneeringthe social photography of the city marketplaces. einAt the beginning of the 20th century and especially after WorldWar I, the photographic activity in Lithuania gained statureand prestige. In 1933 the Society of Amateur Photographers(Liewvos Foto Megeju Sajunga) was founded. During the shortperiod between the two World Wars,when Lithuania enjoyedindependence from Russia , there were feverish developmentsin photography, both artistic and commercial. A number ofdevoted practitioners emerged as artists documenting the lifeand sites of the newborn state. This group included:L nlitfed, Brothers CerniauskaiJanas Bulhakas (1876-1950), poet, painter, writer and publisherof booklets on photography, was an avid photographer, notedfor producing sensitive scenes of the city of Vilnius and thelakes of Narutis. During his lifetime Bulhakas made some100,000 photographs ofVilnillS and Lithuania . His works wereused in many magazines and publications. Bulhakas is creditedwith being one of the first teachers of fUle art photography onthe European continent. From 1921 to 1939 he taught artisticphotography at the University of Vilnius, published a numberof volumes of his photographic work and wrote several bookson the history and theory of art photography in Polish. In1922 a collection of his photographs of Vilnius was publishedin a Lithuanian edition. During the first Soviet occupation ofLithuania (1940-41), Bulhakas' studio and archives were nation alized. His collections were destroyed by fire during the sec ond Russian advance into Vilnius in July 1944.AfterWorld WarII Bulhakas settled in Poland where he died in 1950.Balys Buracas (1897-1972), a high school teacher and an ethno graphiC enthusiast, devoted his spare time to travelling acrossLithuania photographing the countrySide people, their arti facts, architectural sites and folk art works. His output totalsover 11,000 photographic plates and negatives. For his photo graphic contribution, Buracas was awarded a gold medal in theParis International ExpOSition in 1937. Buracas is consideredby some to be the prototype for a Lithuanian photographictradition. This tradition consists, to a large extent, in the docu mentation of authentic ethnographic subjects - the countrypeople, their hand-built primitive architecture, ancient cos 1

tumes and artifacts. In 1921 a volume of 160 reproductions ofBuracas' photographs was published in Vilnius. The statureof thi s photographic collection of ethnic persuasion has nowbeen recognized by experts. Its influence has gained impor tance , especially among those interested in developing theconcept of a genuine and distinctive school of Lithuanianphotography.Homeward Bound, Village Markets Series, Aleksandras MacijauskasVytautas Augustinas (b. 1912), photojournalist and art photogra pher, filled the pages of the magazines and newspapers pub lished in Lithuania before World War II. BeSides photographingthe beautiful landscapes and monuments of historic and archi tectural importance, Augustinas was a sought-after photographerto document events of cultural and social life, as well as officialstate functions of independent Lithuania. He published a selec tion of his photographs in a volume entitled Lithuania, whichcame out in the United States as a second edition in 1955.Kazys Daugela (b. 1912), an engineer and teacher, became anart photographer documenting life around him in the pre-warLithuania.After the war, as a refugee, he produced a memo rable series about the plight of the Lithuanian DisplacedPersons in camps in West Germany.An impressive volume ofhis photographs, /seiviai is Lietuvos (refugees from Lithuania) ,featuring the Jife of the refugees in post-war Germany, waspublished in 1992 in Vilnius. Now a resident of the UnitedStates. Daugela continues photographing his countrymen hereas well as other subjects worthy of his artistic eye, with a viewtowards participating in photographic contests and exhibitions.Meeting of the Veterans, Antanas SutkusAfter World '\X[ar II. when Lithuania was occupied by theSoviet Union for the econd time, photographic activity inLithuania was notably diminished. The artistiC output wasnon-existent for more than a decade. The photographyproduced under supervision of the State was stale, artificialand consciously embellished to project the "bright" side oflife under communism. It was years later that these direconditions were lightened, and the freedom of expression, tosome degree, restored.In 1958, the first exhibition by photOjournalists was organizedin Vilnius . Prizes for best pictures were awarded, and firstprize went to V Stanionis from the town of AJytus.After theinitial success, it became clear that some kind of associ arionfor working photographers would be needed to p rom te alListic expression. The photographers' section was eSlab . hedwithin the framework of the Association of ] oumaLi . In1959 , another exhibition of photographs W 3.:l curated and ;)catalog was published, the first photogr.lphic publicatio nsince the end of the war.A group sI10\\- repre rum the bestartist photography in Lithuania W :IS ubequ ot1 - nt a broad .11 afterwardsvisiting Prague, Bucharest, Be rlin and P.drithe National Committee of PhOlograpben. \yilh local chaptersin the provinces. was esta bli -hed within [he ssociation ofJournalists. There foil )wed annual a.nd emjannual shows, inwhich names of indiyi dual phot gl"'ap hers began to emerge.L. Ruikas . R. Rakau ', . -'1. Baranaukas , A. Sutkus, andI. Vaicekauskas became torchbearers of artistic photography2

in Lithuania at that time. A number of local photographerstook part in these shows who were not members of theAssociation of Journalists, creating the impetus to form anindependent chapter of artist-photographers, which wasftrst organized in Kaunas in 1966. It was spearheaded byVJasinevicius, under whose leadership the Kaunas grouporganized a show and published a catalog. In this publication,the novel view of photography as an art form was stressed(this was about the same time as when the question of pho tography versus art was debated in the United States.)Rationalizing that photography was, after all , a legitimate formof artistic expression allowing the photographer to express onfUm his views and emotions in a subjective manner, the newgro up of independent photographers in Lithuania took a bold er lance against the imposed and stale documentation pro moted by rhe officialdom. Among these bold pjoneers, we findthe name of oon-to-become masters of Lithuanian photogra ph::.-\. :\lacijau kas, V Butyrinas and V Luckus.The first 010 exhibitions also came into being in Kaunas.111bodid a lot to promote the notion that pho l gr.lp were be ing respected as works of fine art. The uu. gr up ga, 'e shows to out-of-state photographers,in uilin mo - ' from Moscow, Leningrad (now St. Petersburg)d'i. It also started organizing annual exhibitions bye ph lographe rs from the three Baltic States (Lithuania,I.:ln ' and Estonia). which eventually became traditional! - called The Amber Country, exhibitions that are contin , d:t .Evening Violin, Romualdas Rakauskasme photographers of ViInjus joined the Kaunasup \ nture by producing a memorable show of the four·-l.lm wn artists - R. Rakauskas and V Naujikas fromand . Suth.'Us and A. Kuncius from Vilnius. This showepred for exhibition at the Lithuanian Art Museum inmea ning that photographs were finally accepted bydIe officials as works of art. The doors were opened for aw 'der international exchange - Lithuanian photographycx.tubitions ",'ent to Canada, Argentina, France, Holland,Belgium and Poland , as well as in the republics of the formeriel onion.I.oca1 wem in the provinces followed suit.The Photographyub f iauiiai (establjshed in 1%6) became very active andinnm-atin:. It started organizing "Photo Weeks" which were con mnons with a wide ranging agenda of talks by experts, shows,and pconferences. The prime mover of this activjty wasA, Oi.l} . p hotographer and an avid collector of photograph.icrn morabilia. He started gathering old pieces of photographicequipment, long forgotten photographs, no longer needed publi cation . and other "garbage," storing it all at his house until therewas no more room left for living quarters. In 1969 the collectiontook on the name of museum and became, in 1976, the ftrst offi cially recognized national museum of photography in the formerSoviet Union.3