Jurate Mykolaityte

To say that Jurate Mykolaityte is of international importance is no exaggeration.

She has exhibited her work for more than thirty years, countless times in her own city of Vilnius as well as in every other large city in Lithuania. She has exhibited from Moscow to London, and the countries of Latvia, Poland, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, Turkey, Greece, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Holland and Luxembourg. Her paintings have been bought by museums in Lithuania, Russia and America.

As there have been close to fifty articles over the past twenty years analysing and extolling her paintings, a few words here would not be out of place.

After her graduation from the Art Academy she was assigned by the soviet authorities a "studio" underground in a dim basement with only one small window. Making a virtue of adversity, she abandoned bright colours that could not be judged properly under artificial light and turned to greys and earth colours. She gave up intricate detail that needed bright daylight and used mostly broad brushes. In this way she developed a mystic, dreamlike style within an incisive intelligence.

Jurate Mykolaityte does in fact often draw images from her subconscious as well as from her surroundings; she talks about images in part coming from her dreams and partly coming from things around her, her beloved city of Vilnius especially, as well as tables, chairs, household objects and the tools of her profession. These she uses as metaphors for ideas.

Paintings by this artist: