FRAGMENTS OF THE DECADE: LITHUANIA

Three volumes of academic twentieth-century Lithuanian art history cover the period from 1900 to 1960. Pre-modernist and Modernist art resides in those books. Contemporary Lithuanian art, however, is still being studied from newspapers and magazines as well as collections of articles, which, according to the prominent art critic Alfonsas Andriuskevicius (the author of a few historical cocktails), “at least in the meantime fill a gap.” The history of some forty years of Lithuanian art is full of omissions. What about the latest, current decade — is it possible to reflect on it historically through the lens of such irrregular documentation and analysis?

The period of Independence (1989–2002) has been one of such diversity that when one attempts to generalize about this period, its fragmentary nature seems to be the most prominent characteristic. This quality is a result of the most active propeller of present-day art activity — exhibitions. Previously, art criticism was considered to represent the self-consciousness of Lithuanian art. In the current period the curator — a designer of ideas — has replaced the art critic in that role. It is because of the irregular rhythm of curated projects that the evolution of Lithuanian art seems fragmented, as compared to art of the earlier period. The majority of exhibitions held in Lithuania in the 1960s - 80s (group, solo, various regional biennials, triennials) were passive installments that did not significantly stimulate the emergence nor the circulation of artworks.

Today, the history of art is being staged by a producer (such as a curator or institution). Whenever mention is made of the most vivid changes in Lithuanian art life after 1990, the emphasis seems to be placed on the activities of various institutions: financing, coordinating and organizing bodies; the builders of the art market, artists’ groups and various associations. Lithuanian Art 1989 - 1999: the Ten Years, the exhibition marking the anniversary of the Contemporary Art Centre of Vilnius, revealed the special importance of this institution, the most active one in Lithuanian contemporary art. Indeed, the ambitious international program of CAC distinguishes itself not only in Lithuania but in a wider European context as well.

In the simplest interpretation, the development of Lithuanian art of the 1990s is seen as a radical revolution — a complete rejection of the old system of art values, which matured in the closed Soviet environment. However, the processes of ten years ago are barely radical in the longer view. Despite an apparent long-lasting traditionalism, Lithuanian artists had been fostering the nonconformist (Modernist) spirit over the post-war decades. The collection of the “silent” Lithuanian Modernism shown in 1997 at the CAC, for example, featured a broad representation of these alternative artistic gestures. And the concept of semi-nonconformist art formulated by Lithuanian art criticism enriched the ranks of the “revolutionary escapists” to an even greater extent. Indeed, in the second half of the twentieth century, artistic development was slow but clearly not stagnant.

It would be unreasonable, though, to look for direct links between the “slow” (or “silent”) Lithuanian avant-garde and the peculiar tendencies of the current decade. During the ‘90s, Lithuanian art has become fragmented due to several tangible geopolitical forces. The most prominent is the situation of eastern and central Europe. The expansionary cultural activities of the Soros Foundations and art centres (SCCA-Lithuania operated during 1993 - 1999) have consolidated this region through financial and organizational means. This was no chance occurrence, but rather part of the deliberate formation of a new economic and political region. One result is that the contemporary culture of eastern Europe is viewed with nostalgic exoticism in the dominant western Eurocentric gaze. This has not only stimulated the circulation of ideas in the region but also speeded up a “collective” integration into an international context of contemporary art. Lithuanian artists have made use of this period, during which new vistas opened up for them. Artists have gone through the upswing and have now reached the current state of tough competition.

No less important for the international reputation of Lithuanian art is another geopolitical force that emerged at nearly the same time — the art of the Baltic and Nordic countries. Estonians, Latvians and Lithuanians presented contemporary art of the early ‘90s to the western public, at the same time and often at joint events. A rather stable circle of Baltic artists-legionaries was formed over the course of several years. An influential exhibition to articulate one of the first joint “fragments” of new Baltic art was the 1992 Tallinn exhibition Forma Anthropologica, which consolidated the region’s artistic image. The artists who got their start in this exhibition began their international careers in projects that were realized in neighbouring Scandinavia at the beginning of the decade. The continuous Baltic-Nordic biennials created particularly favourable conditions for such activities. It is no wonder that the first to acquire works by contemporary Lithuanian artists were Nordic museums.

At first glance, the 1990s decade seems to have distinguished itself in the history of late twentieth-century Lithuanian art by its new formal language. Artists chose contemporary art tools without the slightest hesitation, even despite their lack of academic knowledge in the field. Chronologically, the beginning and first half of the decade witnessed a growing interest in objects and object-type installations, and later artists took up more mixed media (video, sound) projects, which further incorporated life into art. In the late ‘90s, however, radical formalist gestures were gradually giving way as artists’ collaborations and individual artists’ works took a new direction, away from the more traditional contrast of opposites: new vs. old, etc. Projects based on reflexive narration, communication and discussion do not feature a completely new contemporary art language. They present a new strategy, which emerged after emancipation, when there was no separation between art and politics, individual and society, east and west, male and female. Instead, artists have developed something else — a context informed by the complex relationships of dependence. Statements are now changed into discussion, exclusivity into participation, the novelty of art language into interaction with other contemporary means of visual expression.

I have been speaking and writing about the ‘90s for a long time. Before starting to conceive this paper, I reviewed the issues I had discussed or made generalizations about and decided which of them were worth mentioning again. I concluded that there is only one idea, from the footnotes of a report that I made in 1996 (at the conference of the Baltic art exhibition Personal Time, in Zacheta gallery in Warsaw), that I can still use: critical generalizations about art are of a transitory nature. Year after year in the course of the ‘90s, as development in art accelerated, new signs marking the legitimization of contemporary art in today’s cultural and social life were discovered. However, these joyful discoveries so rapidly became part of the status quo that before one finished elaborating an idea, one would be wondering at the inadequacy of the words that had just been spoken.

Lolita Jablonskiene
2002

Lolita Jablonskiene is an art critic and curator based in Vilnius. She heads the Contemporary Art Information Center (CAIC), which spun off from the Soros Foundation, and joined the Lithuanian Art Museum to work for Vilnius’ forthcoming Modern Art Museum. She was commissioner of the Lithuanian pavilion at the Venice Biennial (1999), has curated contemporary art exhibitions in her home country and abroad, and contributed critical texts to Lithuanian and foreign press.


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