Brushstrokes of Vilnius

Franciszek Smuglewicz is one of the most famous Lithuanian artists of the 18th century. He was born into a family of painters in Warsaw. He studied under his father’s court painter, 

Łukasz Smuglewicz, and his relative, the painter Szymon Czechowicz. When Smuglewicz went to Rome to continue his studies, he was not only noticed but also became famous among Italians for his paintings of the ruins and landscapes of the ancient buildings in Rome. In 1785-1786, commissioned by Adam Kazimierz Czartoriski, he created a cycle of paintings of Vilnius, showing the decaying palaces of the rulers, the crumbling Upper and Lower Castles, the city walls and gates, and panoramas of Vilnius. Many of these objects have not survived, so their immortalisation is extremely valuable not only as art but also as a source of history and as material for studying the architecture of vanished buildings. From 1797 to 1807, P. Smuglewicz headed the Department of Drawing and Painting at Vilnius University. In 1802-1804, he decorated the hall now named after him in the Vilnius University Library. The classical painting of this hall is considered one of the most impressive in Lithuania.

F. Smuglewicz paintings can be seen in Vilnius in the gallery of the National Art Museum of Lithuania in Chodkevičiai Palace and in Vilnius Cathedral.

Sometimes, Jan Rustem’s name and surname are written in Armenian characters (Յան Ռուստամ). He was born in Constantinople, but his origins are somewhat unclear: some consider him Armenian, others Turkish, others Kartvelian. On one of his visits to the capital of the Ottoman Empire, the nobleman Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski brought back a ten-year-old, claiming that the boy was his servant. However, some have pointed out the similarities between the facial features of A. K. Czartoryski and J. Rustem. Could he perhaps have been an illegitimate son presented as a servant? J. Rustem can be jokingly called the pioneer of selfies, as the artist was very fond of painting self-portraits, especially with an Eastern hat. More seriously, he was one of the most famous Lithuanian artists of the early 19th century, a lecturer at Vilnius University, the head of the Department of Drawing and Painting, and the tutor of a whole host of other celebrities. The first art exhibitions in Vilnius were organised under Rustem’s care, featuring the works of Vilnius University student artists.

The wall of the Faculty of History is marked by a plaque commemorating the most famous Ukrainian poet – Taras Shevchenko. Few people know that he was not only a poet but also a painter and graphic artist, with more than 800 works of art and more than 200 lost works. While living in Vilnius, T. Shevchenko attended art classes taught by J. Rustem.

Rustem’s works are preserved in the Lithuanian National Museum of Art, the National Museum of Lithuania, the National Museum of Art of Mykalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis, and the Wroblewski (Vrublevskių) Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences.

J. Rustemo kūriniai saugomi Lietuvos nacionaliniame dailės muziejuje, Lietuvos nacionaliniame muziejuje, Nacionaliniame Mikalojaus Konstantino Čiurlionio dailės muziejuje, Lietuvos mokslų akademijos Vrublevskių bibliotekoje.

In 1866, Ivan Trutnev arrived in Vilnius, and the Vilnius Drawing School he founded trained a generation of some of the most famous artists of our region in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was open to all, regardless of nationality, religion, social status, or gender. Boys attended on odd-numbered days and girls on even-numbered days of the week. It was one of the first art schools to admit Jewish youngsters. Young people from all over the region (Lithuania, Belarus) were attracted to study there. In total, more than 1,500 pupils attended the school during its lifetime, with more than 100 artists graduating, more than 50 of whom went on to study at the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg and the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. The school was so famous that it was dubbed the Académie de Vilna in France. Its pupils – the Jewish painters Chaïm Soutine, Pinchus Krémègne, Emmanuel Mane-Katz, and others – are known by the generic name of the École de Paris. Jacques Lipchitz, Chaïm Soutine, Michel Kikoine, Lev Antokolsky, Adam Międzybłocki, Józef Bałzukiewicz, Vytautas Kairiūkštis, Juozas Zikaras, Juozapas Kamarauskas, and many other Lithuanian and world art celebrities attended the school while it was operational until 1915.

The Rome-born painter Bolesław Rusiecki, son of the better-known painter Kanuty Rusiecki (especially famous for his landscapes of Vilnius and Italian cities), had an apartment on St. Johns’ Street. He painted portraits, self-portraits, still life, and religious paintings, including for Vilnius Cathedral. The Lithuanian National Museum of Art, the Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences, and the National Museums of Krakow and Warsaw are the custodians of his work. B. Rusiecki was not only a painter but also a patron of the arts; in his will, he bequeathed his library, archive, and collected works of art to the Society of the Friends of Science and donated 10,000 roubles to construct a building to house the Society in Vilnius (where the Vytautas Kasiulis Art Museum is currently located). Rusiecki owned the Kernavėlė Manor near Kernavė, and this was his preferred living place during the warm summer season before returning to Vilnius for most of the autumn, winter, and spring. Rusiecki kept beehives at Kernavėlė Manor and would transport them to his Vilnius home in the autumn. When the weather warmed up in spring, the artist would open the window, and the bees would fly out to Vilnius’s flower gardens, trees, and herbs.

B.Rusiecki’s works are now under the care of the Lithuanian National Museum of Art and the Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences. Paintings by his father, Kanuty Rusiecki, can also be seen in the Lithuanian National Museum of Art.

The Vilnius Picture Gallery was established in 1994 in the classicist former palace of the Chodkiewicz (Chodkevičius) family – magnates of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Its permanent exhibition presents a collection of Lithuanian art based on works by Vilnius artists (Franciszek Smuglewicz, Jan Rustem, Kanuty Rusiecki, Wincenty Smokowski, Walenty Wańkowicz, etc.) who were both teachers and students at the Vilnius School of Art in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Many of the artists’ paintings are portraits of the most prominent Vilnius citizens of the 16th and 19th centuries, while the cityscapes captured various places through brushstrokes, including the 1872 painting ‘Vilnius Viewed from Taurus Hill’ by Józef Marszewski. Kanuty Rusiecki was also a prolific painter; his city scenes depict the Church of St. Peter and St. Paul, the water mills in the Paplauya district – the wooden Potocki mill and the brick Tyszkiewicz, the Bernardine Garden, the Chain Bridge over the Vilnia River, Žvėrynas, the banks of the River Vilnia in Užupis, the panorama of the city from the hills of Naujininkai, the De Reus Palace in front of the Presidential Palace, the Gates of Dawn, a portrait of a Lithuanian girl with willows at the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Consolidation. The Bernardine Cemetery was immortalised by Rusiecki’s son Bolesław; other notable works include Edward Mateusz Römer’s painting of the courtyard by his house on Bokšto Street and Marcelli Januszkiewicz’s depiction of the Palace of Verkiai, as well as many others. The collection at the Vilnius Picture Gallery is a veritable gold mine of old Lithuanian and Vilnius art.

The most famous 20th century Lithuanian artist – Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis – lived in Vilnius from Autumn 1907 to Spring 1908. During this period, Čiurlionis was active in the public life of the Lithuanians in the city – he played a role in founding the Lithuanian Art Society, organised the first Lithuanian art exhibition and presented his works of art there. He was also very musical and directed the choir of the Vilnius Canticle Society, gave concerts, and created paintings and writing. On 17 May 1908, at the Polesian Railwaymen’s Club (now A. Jakšto g. 9A), Čiurlionis gave his first concert with a choir in Vilnius; part of the money raised was allocated to the needy members of the Lithuanian Art Society.

At that time, Čiurlionis was a frequent guest at the salon of Marija and Jurgis Šlapeliai in Šnipiškės, where he liked to play the piano for Lithuanian intellectuals.

Čiurlionis designed the stage curtain for the ‘Rūta Society’, Vilnius’s most important Lithuanian cultural centre in the early 20th century. The architectural panorama of Vilnius is recognisable in the artist’s painting ‘Prelude to the City of Vytis’ and other works.

An exhibition of 300 pieces by the artist was held in 1911. After his death, his works were displayed in the hall of the ‘Liutnia’ Theatre (now the Lithuanian National Drama Theatre)’ In the interwar period, the M. K. Čiurlionis Art Museum was built in Kaunas to exhibit these works.

In 1995, a memorial cultural centre, the Čiurlionis House, was established in the apartment where M. K. Čiurlionis had lived in Vilnius; concerts, exhibitions and other events are held here.

The German-born Römer family that lived on Bokšto Street in the second half of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century was famous for its painters, artists, and their ensuing dynasties: the Vilnius painter Edward Jan Römer achieved renown, as did his sons Alfred Izydor Römer and Edward Mateusz Römer. The father, Edward Jan Römer, studied painting with Jan Rustem, while the younger son, Edward Mateusz, studied with Kanuty Rusiecki and Jan Zienkiewicz, and the older son, Alfred – with Wincenty Dmochowski and Kanuty Rusiecki.

E. J. Römer took an active part in creating the Vilnius Antiquities Museum, took care of its art collection, and painted portraits of the Lithuanian nobility. His son Alfredas painted portraits and was interested in Lithuanian ethnography: he painted national clothes, folk crosses, etc. Almost sure to lift one’s mood is A. Römer’s series of amusing drawings that he liked to create virtually every evening; they depict humorous scenes, cartoons, and caricatures. He made monochrome pencil sketches of the Missionary Church, the courtyards of Pilies and Bokšto Streets, the gates of the Basilian Monastery, the tower of the Bernardine Church, and the main thoroughfare of Šv. Jurgio Avenue (St. George’s – now Gedimino Avenue), etc. Alfred’s brother, Edward Mateusz, was most famous for his landscapes and depictions of nature. Still, he also painted portraits and encapsulated Kaziuko (St. Casimir’s) Fair through his brushstrokes, as well as the railway station, the courtyard of the Römer family’s house on Bokšto Street, and the interiors of this house as pencil drawings.

Edward Jan Römer’s works are held by the Lithuanian National Museum of Art, the Lithuanian National Museum, the Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences, and Alfred Römer’s pieces can also be seen at the Lithuanian National Art Museum.

Mariana Veriovkina, a well-known avant-garde artist in Europe at the turn of the 20th century, lived in Vilnius and Kaunas for several years before the outbreak of the First World War. She spent her summers at Vyžuonėliai Manor in Utena district.

At the end of the 19th century, she settled in Western Europe: Munich from 1896 to 1914 and Switzerland from 1914 to 1938. She was known as Marianne von Werefkin. While living in Munich, she participated in the Munich art movements: the avant-garde New Artists’ Association founded in 1909 and the Blue Rider (Der Blaue Reiter) movement founded by the Expressionists in 1912 (the artist herself was very fond of horse riding).

In 1914, Veriovkina exhibited her latest paintings at the Vilnius Art Society exhibition, presenting Expressionist art for the first time in Lithuania; she also gave a lecture on modern art. A dozen or so of her paintings depict provincial Lithuania, as well as the cities of Kaunas and Vilnius. The artist’s depiction of the Church of St. Anne and the Vilnia riverbank, as well as a police post and the towers of a church in Vilnius at night.

Ferdynand Ruszczyc is one of the most prominent Vilnius artists of the early 20th century. He took an active role in public life by organising art exhibitions and participating in the publication of newspapers and books; he was also one of the collaborators in the restoration of Vilnius University after World War I. He was also one of the initiators of the photographs of the monuments of the Old Town of Vilnius (commissioned by his friend Jan Bułhak).

When Vilnius University was restored in 1919, Ruszczyc became the Dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts and taught at Vilnius University. He painted several paintings depicting Vilnius, and as a graphic artist, he illustrated the pages of several publications related to Vilnius. He lived in various apartments: in Užupis (1908-1915), on Universiteto Street (1919-1922), and Pilies Streets (1923-1934).

In the courtyard of Pilies Street, Ruszczyc was responsible for the installation of a memorial plaque to the poet Juliusz Słowacki; eight decades later, he himself was immortalised on another plaque nearby.

The works of Ferdynand Ruszczyc can be seen at the Lithuanian National Museum of Art in Vilnius.

Juozapas Kamarauskas was a late 19th–20th century Lithuanian engineer, architect, and painter. Born in Vilkmergės  (Ukmergės) district, from 1922 onwards, he settled permanently in Vilnius. His watercolours depict the most famous architectural monuments of Vilnius: the Cathedral Bell Tower, the Church of St. Anne, St. Michael’s Church, the Missionary Church, the Franciscan Church, St. Stephen’s, and other churches. He also painted the Orthodox Churches in the neighbourhoods of Žvėrynas, Liepkalnis, and the Vilnius Mosque, which was destroyed after the war. Among his paintings are depictions of the Evangelical Lutheran Cemetery Chapel on Tauro Hill, the Great Synagogue of Vilnius, the Chapel of St. Rocco in the Churchyard of St. Stephen’s Church, and the city’s panoramas and surroundings – Užvingis, Antakalnis, the main road to Nemenčinė, Kalvarijos, Trinapolis, the Green (Žalieji) Lakes, and Trakai. His works from the 1890s are of particular value. The watercolours created by J. Kamarauskas serve as witness to the historical reconstructions of extinct buildings in the Old Town of Vilnius, such as the Upper and Lower Castles (including the Palace of the Grand Dukes), the Bell Tower of the Franciscan Church, the gates of the city wall, etc., as well as the layout of the streets of the Old Town of Vilnius. The pictures painted by him between 1914 and 1945 reveal the damage caused to architectural monuments, houses and entire blocks (such as on Vokiečių St, Didžioji Street, and Švarco Street) that were demolished in the post-war period. Perhaps Kamarauskas’s best-known work is the iconic reconstruction of the Vilnius Lower Castle (the Palace of the Grand Dukes). It was used to decorate a box of sweets, and part of the proceeds from its sale were used to finance the reconstruction of the palace. Kamarauskas lived on S. Skapo Street before moving to Šv. Kazimiero g. 9 in 1927 and then, after 1943 – he lived at Didžioji g. 28.

The National Art Museum of Lithuania holds about 400 works by Kamarauskas, while the National Museum of Lithuania also has some pieces by J. Kamarauskas.

The residence of the Lithuanian rulers in the Lower Castle was the political, administrative, and cultural centre of the state from the founding of Lithuania in the 13th century until the mid-17th century. The Palace of the Grand Dukes was dismantled in the early 19th century, but the remaining masonry has survived. The original building was immortalised by Franciszek Smuglewicz (1786), Marcin Knackfus, and Pietro de Rosio (1793); the building continued to be depicted by artists in the 19th century and early 20th century, although it was no longer standing by this point. The Palace was also painted by Kazimierz Raczyński (1832), Marcelli Januszewicz (1840), Napoleon Orda (1876), Alfred Römer (in the 1880s – 9th decade of the 19th century), Juozapas Kamarauskas (1894), Kazys Šimonis (1925), Vytautas Landsbergis-Žemkalnis (1949), and others. The building itself has been restored on the basis of particularly abundant archaeological material, but the visual material has been no less important. Photography was not yet available then, but Smuglewicz’s depiction of the palace from different angles was precise. For this, artists often used… mirrors.

The Palace is an example of the power of art to express the symbolic significance of this building. The Palace has been depicted by several generations of artists, some of whom had not yet been born when the Palace was demolished. Although they did not see it in person, they still felt that this symbol of the state was very relevant to them as it was a testimony to the formerly independent state since the Lower Castle and the residence of the Grand Dukes was the political centre of the state.

No other church in Lithuania has as many valuable paintings as Vilnius Cathedral. The walls of the side aisles and the pillars (columns) are decorated with paintings depicting biblical scenes, created especially for the cathedral by Lithuania’s most famous painters and guest artists. Franciszek Smuglewicz painted twelve pictures of the Apostles, which hang on the pilasters, the high altar, and the two side aisles. The Italian Costantino Villani produced sixteen paintings, eight in each side aisle (the north and south aisles with themes from the New and Old Testaments, respectively). It is the most expressive cycle of paintings on biblical themes in Lithuania. Two paintings at the entrance to the cathedral were painted in 1815 by Józef Hilary Głowacki and one by Kanuty Rusiecki. Fourteen paintings of the Stations of the Cross were painted in 1909 by Nikodim Silivanovich.

Several paintings from the 17th and 18th centuries in the aisles and side chapels belong to the paintbrushes of unknown masters. A three-armed painting of Saint Casimir, the patron saint of Lithuania, was painted in 1521 and adorns the chapel of Saint Casimir. Legend has it that the artist wanted to change the position of Casimir’s right hand and painted a different hand but was later unable to paint over the previously painted one. This chapel also houses two frescoes by Michał Anioł Palloni, depicting the two miracles of St. Casimir (the oldest fresco in Lithuania can be seen in the reflection of the mirror when you descend into the crypt of the sanctuary). A painting hangs in the Goštautas Chapel of the late 15th-century St. Casimir, famous for his graces and crowned by the Pope in 1750. There is also a painting of St. Mary known as the Sapiega Madonna.

Mstislav Dobuzhinsky was a nobleman of Lithuanian origin (whose father was Lithuanian and mother was from Novgorod in Russia). He was born in Russia but graduated from school in Vilnius, and while studying law in St. Petersburg, he attended private art lessons. Before the First World War, he worked in theatres in Moscow and St. Petersburg; after 1924, he lived in Kaunas. He worked in London from 1938 to 1939 and moved to the USA when the war broke out. 

Dobuzhinsky is most often called a set designer (his extensive collection is preserved in the Lithuanian Theatre, Music, and Cinema Museum), and he also created interiors, book illustrations, and state heraldry, but he was also an artist who immortalised the Vilnius of the early 20th century. His watercolours depict Stiklių, Žydų, Bernardinų, Latako, Šv. Kazimiero and Tilto Streets, the M.K. Sarbievijus (Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski) Courtyard at Vilniaus University, The Gates of Dawn, the gates of the Basilian Monastery, the gates of the Vizičiai (Visitation)Monastery, St. Catherine’s Church, the neighbourhood of Antakalnis, as well as many other corners of old Vilnius.  

One of Dobuzhinsky’s paintings managed to help preserve several valuable buildings on Tilto St. When the Soviet authorities decided to demolish them in the 1980s and 1990s, the public defended them, arguing that the memorable street view captured in Dobužinski’s painting would be destroyed.

Dobuzhinsky’s works are held by the Lithuanian Theatre, Music, and Film Museum (more than 1,000 items – the most valuable collection of sketches of stage design and the most extensive collection of the artist’s theatre art in Lithuania) and the Lithuanian National Museum of Art. Several of his paintings can be seen in the Vilnius University Library and the Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences.

Look up and give the attic floor of Gedimino pr. 1 your full attention. It was here that Adam Międzybłocki once lived. Adam was born in Griškonys near Butrimonys (Alytus district) to Antanas Międzybłocki, the owner of Gelvonu Manor (Širvintos district), and Valeria – a participant of the 1863 Uprising. Interestingly, his grandfather founded the Birštonas spa resort. 

From 1899, Adam studied at the Vilnius School of Drawing. He continued his art studies in Kraków (1908–1913). During the First World War, he lived in the Caucasus for several years; he continued his art studies in Tbilisi, painted mountain landscapes, and, in 1917, left for Istanbul to continue his studies. After the war, he spent three years living in Warsaw before moving to Vilnius, where he lived from 1922 to 1945. In 1945, he moved to Gdansk.

Adam Międzybłocki had a workshop in the attic of the house opposite the cathedral, where he lived for a total of 30 years; he was a member of the Vilnius Society of Plastic Artists. He painted many architectural landscapes of Vilnius, including the Cathedral, the Gates of Dawn Gate, Literatų, Šv. Kazimiero, Dominikonų, Universiteto, Šv. Ignoto Streets, as well as other streets in Vilnius. He painted Bernardinų Alley, St Anne’s Church and the Bell Tower of St Michael’s Church, the Great Synagogue, the main buildings of Vilnius University, the Bernardine Garden, the churchyard of St. Peter and St. Paul’s Church, and the gates of the Sapiegas Park in Antakalnis, as well as Vilnius Calvary, the Church of the Holy Trinity. He also painted the wooden manors of Vilnius, the panoramic views of the city from the Bell Tower of St. Johns’ Church, the present-day Kalnų Park, the Vilnia riverbank in Užupis, the Neris riverbank, the Green Lakes, and other works. He mainly painted in watercolour, gouache, and pastel.

The National Art Museum of Lithuania has several paintings by Adam Międzybłocki, while other museums, institutions, and individuals have separate works in their private collections.

Raphaël Chwoles, a painter from an old Vilnius family, lived on Tilto Street; according to the story handed down by the family, Rafael’s grandfather collected stones on the banks of the Vilnia River for the construction of a house in Paupys. 

Between 1930 and 1939, Chwoles was a member of the Jewish avant-garde group of artists ‘Jung Vilne’ (‘Young Vilna’). From 1933, he took part in art exhibitions and taught painting in Jewish schools in Vilnius; in 1940, he became the director of the art school in Naujoji Vilnia (a separate town at that time).

Chwoles produced many paintings of Vilnius, in which the city’s streets, courtyards, ruins of the Jewish quarters, and suburban landscapes are recognisable. His work also depicted the Great Synagogue, the Missionary Church, and St. Michael’s Church, as well as local streets, including Šv. Kazimiero, Bernardinų, Žydų, S. Skapo Streets, among others. He also painted Halės Market and post-war demolished neighbourhoods with transitional courtyards, etc. After settling in Warsaw in 1959 and in Paris in 1969, the artist did not forget Vilnius – he painted urban landscapes of the Lithuanian Jeruzalės district (Jerusalem) from memory, as well as sketches and etudes created in Vilnius and photographs taken here.

In addition to urban landscapes, Chwoles also painted a series of portraits of Vilnius residents, including one of his sister, Rivka, who was the Lithuanian and Israeli chess champion and also a painter.

Chwoles’ works are in the possession of the Vilna Gaon Museum of Jewish History, the Lithuanian Art Centre ‘Tartle’ in Vilnius; in the future, they will be on display at the Lithuanian Museum of Jewish Culture and Identity, which will be located in the former building of the Jewish ‘Tarbut’ Gymnasium at Pylimo g. 4.

At the end of the 19th century, the owner of the Palace of the Writers’ Union was Ignatius Korvin-Milevsky, the fabulously wealthy Count of Hieraniony (also known as Geranainys – located in modern-day Belarus), which was a title conferred by the Pope. He was an extravagant man who sailed on the yacht ‘Litwa’ for 20 years, along with representatives of the royal families and elite of Europe in the late 19th to early 20th century. He received the island of St. Catherine in the Adriatic Sea as a gift from his friend, the Archduke Charles Stephen of Austria. 

Ignotas Korvinas-Milevskis was a collector of fine art, and from 1889 to 1893, he amassed a collection of the region’s new art. He was personally acquainted with the artists and paid his best friends very generously for their works of art. Some artists admitted that if it weren’t for the Count buying paintings from them, they would not have the means to support themselves.

I. Korvinas-Milevskis’ collection consisted of more than 200 works by the most famous Polish, Lithuanian, and Belarusian artists of the 19th century (including 16 self-portraits by the most famous artists of that period).

The works were initially stored in Vilnius, in a residence reconstructed by the Count for a special art gallery, but later, they were moved to Lviv, Vienna, Hieraniony, and stored on his personal island, and from 1915, in warehouses in Vienna. After the First World War, the collection was dispersed. Polish art experts began buying the paintings, and the last 15 works ended up in a Viennese antique shop after having ‘wandered’ around Europe and America. Today, most of the collection is housed in the National Museum of Fine Arts in Warsaw, while others are scattered in museums throughout Europe and the world.