{"id":22739,"date":"2024-03-14T17:00:40","date_gmt":"2024-03-14T15:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/nacionaline-dailes-galerija\/parodos\/algimantas-jonas-kuras-hymn-to-a-broken-smile\/"},"modified":"2024-03-14T17:00:40","modified_gmt":"2024-03-14T15:00:40","slug":"algimantas-jonas-kuras-hymn-to-a-broken-smile","status":"publish","type":"paroda","link":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/national-gallery-of-art\/exhibitions\/algimantas-jonas-kuras-hymn-to-a-broken-smile\/","title":{"rendered":"Algimantas Jonas Kuras. Hymn to a Broken Smile\u00a0\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The rusted scraps of mechanisms peaking in the grass, strange, almost unrecognisable industrial objects eroded by the flow of time and jarringly reminding of the ugly side of civilization’s progress. These are the painting motifs that artist Algimantas Jonas Kuras (b. 1940) has been consistently studying throughout his creative career, which spans over 60 years.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This exhibition is akin to a poetic retrospective, presenting the works of the famous painter, the winner of the Lithuanian National Prize for Culture and Arts, and highlighting its relevance in the context of today\u2019s flourishing ecological, quasi-religious ideologies. The issues of human impact on nature, pollution, exploitation of natural resources, recycling, animal body preparation, and human-object-mechanism are often explored in the contemporary fields of arts, nature and social ideas. The eco-catastrophic mood permeates our daily lives and our future. Looking at Kuras\u2019 painting, one could falsely assume seeing only ecological themes in it. However, the author\u2019s goals were to oppose the prevailing ideological background and the propaganda of the optimistic Soviet reality.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The oeuvre of Kuras and his contemporaries (Arvydas \u0160altenis, Kostas Dere\u0161kevi\u010dius, Algimantas \u0160v\u0117g\u017eda) in the 1970s marked an ideological breaking point when the young generation began to oppose the Soviet official culture by choosing creative subjects filled with stinging irony, absurdity, kitsch and banalities. In a personal diary, A. J. Kuras wrote about his and his friends\u2019 goals the following:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018Aestheticizing should be avoided. I suggest looking more critically at all embraced phenomena, opposing the urbanistic understanding of taste, mocking (with works) stagnation, negligence in art, or vice versa, showing one\u2019s truth as an example; hence we decided, active critical realism.\u2019<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u200bThus monumental mechanisms, idealised, aestheticized industrial landscapes began to be replaced by depictions of everyday situations and the environment: meat grinders, people in public transport or toilets, crops being fertilised with chemicals from a helicopter… The author was attracted to everything that was considered borderline in the Soviet culture postulating progress \u2013 abandoned locations, storage rooms, and garbage dumped in the forest, which he used as painting motifs, and also brought back to the workshop as interesting sculptural<\/span> ready-mades<\/span><\/i>, from which he constructed assemblages or installations in his environment.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Having been raised in a rural environment, A. J. Kuras nurtured a unique aesthetic approach, which critics called the \u2018garbage poetry.\u2019 However, the real protagonist of the paintings is time, which condemns material existence to decay and constantly reminds us of its transience. There are only two consistent, unchanging elements \u2013 the earth and the skies. Between them is just a momentary smile.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This is the first exhibition of such a scale presenting a broad panorama and chronology of the artist\u2019s oeuvre, consisting of works stored in the Lithuanian museum funds, private collections and works owned by the author. The exhibition also offers an opportunity to discover Kuras\u2019s original and artistic texts \u2013 the eyewitnesses of the changing era, representing the development of the author\u2019s ideas, and the most important creative principles, which created the foundation for postmodernist thinking in Lithuanian visual arts.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Curator<\/strong>\u00a0Jolanta Marci\u0161auskyt\u0117-Jura\u0161ien\u0117<\/p>\n

Architect<\/strong>\u00a0\u016ala \u017debrauskait\u0117-Malinausk\u0117<\/p>\n

Graphic design\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0Laura Grigali\u016bnait\u0117<\/p>\n

Light artist<\/strong> Milvydas Kezys<\/p>\n

Coordinator<\/strong>\u00a0Ernestas Parulskis<\/p>\n

Coordinator of installation<\/strong>\u00a0 Mindaugas Reklaitis<\/p>\n

Lenders to the exhibtion: <\/strong>MO muziejus, M. K. \u010ciurlionis National Museum of Art, Lithuanian Film Fund,\u00a0 Vilnius “Mintis” gymnasium, “Kult\u016bros barai”, Alfonsas Andriu\u0161kevi\u010dius, Dangis Babikas, Irena ir Vytautas Butrimai, Aleksandra Jacovskyt\u0117, Egidijus Jakubauskas, Zigfridas Jankauskas, Rimas Kulie\u0161ius, Algimantas Kun\u010dius, Algimantas Jonas Kuras, Ramun\u0117 and Robertas Lauciai, Viktoras Liutkus, Vidmantas Martikonis, Juozas Matonis, Vygaudas Me\u0161kauskas, Visvaldas Neni\u0161kis, Gintaras Rinkevi\u010dius, Evaldas Rim\u0161elis, Mindaugas Ruseckas, Vladimiras Tarasovas, Loreta and Mikas Vaicekauskai<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Project funded by<\/strong>\u00a0Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania<\/p>\n

Organisers<\/strong>\u00a0LNMA National Gallery of Art<\/p>\n

Sponsors:<\/strong>“Exterus”, Fundermax<\/p>\n

Media Partners:<\/strong>\u00a0JCDecaux, Artnews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The rusted scraps of mechanisms peaking in the grass, strange, almost unrecognisable industrial objects eroded by the flow of time and jarringly reminding of the ugly side of civilization’s progress. These are the painting motifs that artist Algimantas Jonas Kuras (b. 1940) has been consistently studying throughout his creative career, which spans over 60 years.\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tags":[],"department":[74],"parodos-zymos":[195],"class_list":["post-22739","paroda","type-paroda","status-publish","hentry","department-national-gallery-of-art","parodos-zymos-paroda"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/paroda\/22739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/paroda"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/paroda"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/paroda\/22739\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22739"},{"taxonomy":"department","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/department?post=22739"},{"taxonomy":"parodos-zymos","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lndm.devmerit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/parodos-zymos?post=22739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}