Giedrė Jankevičiūtė (PDF)
https://doi.org/10.53631/DIS/2017.8.5
The article analyses the phenomenon of the myth of Samogitia and its influence on modernist painting of the 20th century. The theme is developed by focusing on three aspects: How and why Samogitia attracted and fascinated modernist artists throughout the 20th century, despite political, cultural, lifestyle and value changes in Lithuania; how artists’ pilgrimages to Samogitia developed and how their phases differed; how Samogitia was perceived and interpreted in works of art and photography, and what meaning these images had for contemporaries and later generations. The significance and impact of the Samogitian myth on modernist Lithuanian art and photography in the 20th century are linked to the search for national identity throughout the entire period and the desire to create an alternative to official culture, especially during the Soviet era. The conclusion is drawn that the myth of Samogitia was significant in forming the foundations of Lithuanian national art (Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis), re-actualising the national heritage in interwar Lithuania (the creation of Adomas Galdikas and the members of the ‘Ars’ group and, especially, Antanas Gudaitis) and the search for resistance to Sovietisation in the second half of the 20th century, especially in the 1960s and 1980s. Among other examples, the phenomenon of Vilius Orvidas is discussed, as is the impact of the ideas of the self-educated philosopher Justinas Mikutis on the painters Arūnas Vaitkūnas, Eugenijus Varkulevičius and Vaidotas Žukas. In independent Lithuania, the myth of Samogitia ceased to stimulate the imagination of artists and the public. The region became an object of study for ethnologists and anthropologists, as well as an object of the so-called anthropological photography, an example of which is the photography by Arūnas Baltėnas.
Keywords: memory, national identity, painting, modernism, photography