LOLITA JABLONSKIENÉ (LT) National Gallery of Art, Chief Curator

1. National Gallery of Art in Action
Lolita Jablonskiene

2. National Gallery of Art
Vilnius

3. National Gallery of Art
Vilnius

4. NGA programme
• 20th-21st
c. art collection display
• Temporary exhibitions
• Public programs
• Guided tours & education
• Art information centre / Mediateque

5. International exhibitions
2009 / 2010
Vytautas Kairiūkštis and his Milieu
A Million and One Days
Dialogues of Colour and Sound
Cold War Modern

6. Public programs
Conferences, seminars Education
Information center Concerts, etc

7. 20th
c. Lithuanian art collection
display
10 halls
180 artists
450 art works

8. www.ndg.lt

9. Information terminals

10. Facebook

11. Audioguide

12. Audioguide

13. BOUNDARIES OF THE REAL
In 1968, an exhibition in Vilnius of K. Zimblytė’s abstract paintings and collages was closed
down because of its Formalism. This symbolised the increasingly clear divide in Lithuanian art in
the post-Stalinist period. On one side, there were state commissions and official art exhibitions;
and on the other there were shows of officially unacceptable works in obscure public and private
spaces. Most artists balanced between both modes of existence, and the development of
unofficial Lithuanian art from the 1960s to the 1980s was later called ‘Silent Modernism’.
The most radical artists rejected the representation and the subjective interpretation of reality,
and sought to question the very notion of reality, and explore the boundaries of its perception.
Starting in the late 1950s, artists began working with abstraction, which evolved out of the
visual structures of landscapes and still lifes, since there was not a strong local tradition of
abstract art. Most hailed from other professions: they were architects, theatre designers and
craftsmen. …

14. Vincentas Gečas. Demonstration by the Unemployed. 1965
The young Vincentas Gečas painted Demonstration by the Unemployed in 1965
from sketches and impressions gathered during an internship he had in Italy two years
previously. This internship was an exceptional fact not only in Gečas’ biography. In the
mid-1960s, any trip abroad by a Soviet citizen, even a short one, was an important
experience, of which most of the residents of the Lithuanian SSR were deprived.
Therefore, a long ten-month stay in Italy was an extraordinary event in the whole art life
of Lithuania.
The contemporary artistic atmosphere in Italy at the time of Gečas’ visit was
socially engaged and overtly leftist. Galleries often showed political art by Renato
Guttuso and other Italian artists associated to Neorealism.
The painter produced two versions of Demonstration. The first one was
achromatic, just black and white, therefore photographic or cinematographic in
character. The second one, presented in this hall, by contrast, is almost an eyesore
because of its blue, orange and yellow colour combinations. The image evokes media
reportage. …