Portrait of Vladas Eidukevičius
Portrait of Vladas Eidukevičius
Portrait of Vladas Eidukevičius

Portrait of Vladas Eidukevičius

Author: Dobuzhinsky Mstislav , 1875 - 1957

Created: 1934.

Material / technique: paper, cardboard, pencil.

Dimensions: 48x30 cm.

Signature:  1949 / 1934 Dobužinsky (in the bottom-right corner of the painting); in the bottom-left side:  Vladas Eidukevičius.

The person portrayed here, Eidukevičius, took a different path. For twenty years he moved across Europe: St. Petersburg, Moscow, Munich, Berlin, Holland, Switzerland, Italy, Madrid, Rome, Corsica, etc. He endured poor living conditions, loneliness and lack of food, but was profoundly creative and had an insatiable passion for art. ‘With his knowledge of Russian, French, English, Italian, German, and Latvian, he could read Alexander Pushkin, Mikhail Lermontov, Alexander Blok, Janis Rainis, François Villon, Robert Burns, William Wordsworth, and early William Blake works in the original,’ <...> ‘He loved music. He knew the pieces of many composers by heart and hummed them. Johann Sebastian Bach, Antonio Vivaldi, Jean-Baptiste Lully, Modest Mussorgsky, and Ludwig van Beethoven were his favourites. He was particularly fond of the music and paintings of Konstantinas Čiurlionis.’ In 1932, Eidukevičius returned to Lithuania. This period marked the height of his creative maturity: ‘While in Lithuania, the aim of my work crystallised, my technique matured, combining of paint equilibrated, and generally, my art improved.’ Eidukevičius was painted by Dobužinskis seven years before the fateful day of 22 June 1941 when the bullet of a Nazi soldier cut short Eidukevičius’ life. His creative heritage was scattered. Art pieces of the last years of his life are presented by art researchers without signatures, creation dates, and with just the inscription – ‘Vladas.’

Reference: Description of the "Meetings" exhibition. - M. K.Čiurlionis National museum of art, Kaunas.

Exhibitions: Exhibition of Vladas Eidukevičius' works „Painter Wanderer“, 18 February 2016, Vilnius Picture Gallery; Exhibition of dr. J. Gumbis art collection “Meetings”, 2015 July 3 – September 6, M. K.Čiurlionis National Museum of Art, Kaunas.

Published: "Vladas Eidukevičius. Painter Wanderer". Vilnius: Lithuanian Art Museum, (compiled by Rima Rutkauskienė), 2016, P. 18.