OLD NEIGHBORS
The street art route created by the “Kiaurai sienas” art laboratory, leading through several towns - Utena, Anykščiai, Molėtai, Dusetos - invites you to remember the rich and various times of prosperity of the Jews of this region. There is certainly no shortage of celebrities from this land, as are breathtaking stories, and the route could be greatly expanded!
The street art route created by the “Kiaurai sienas” art laboratory, leading through several towns - Utena, Anykščiai, Molėtai, Dusetos - invites you to remember the rich and various times of prosperity of the Jews of this region. There is certainly no shortage of celebrities from this land, as are breathtaking stories, and the route could be greatly expanded!
In the meantime, we start with four stories that were meant to be conveyed in completely different ways, such as the stories and the places where the works originated:
Bernardas Lown, a cardiologist, inventor of the defibrillator and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, is immortalized in Utena. Bernard has said in one of his interviews that touching it destroys huge barriers between people. In the central square of Utena, the memory of the doctor will be made meaningful by the heart of a small metal plastic, inviting to touch the story of this prominent man;
In Anykščiai, the story of Miriam Libenzon, a poet who lived here during the interwar period, was reborn in the form of Neofresca. Miriam emigrated to Palestine before World War II and thus escaped death. Unfortunately, her cruel fate did not escape her family left in Anykščiai and her beloved young sister ...
“While living in America, Miriam will constantly remember Anykščiai as a world of visions. Not ideal, but very, even subconsciously own. Fabulous images will flow from the depths of memory; after writing them in lines, after the title of each poem, be sure to mark: "My town Anykst, Lithuania". It’s both an address, and a code, and a destiny. The poems feature a kind of lyrical autobiography with a gentle mourning characteristic of Jewish poetry, an unfading love for the homeland, a sense of loss, and specific images of the Jewish life of a small town. ” (Rimantas Vanagas, “Green Jewish Hair”);
The cozy and cozy community in Molėtai is reminiscent of a charismatic fisherman looking at us from an old, somewhat faded photograph. His image will adorn a metal-plastic inclusion that will be affixed to a historic Jewish building;
In Dusetos, one of the main streets of the town, a delicate enamel inclusion invites you to remember Jewish traditions - the work depicts a Dusetian winning Sabbath candles.
The magical light emanating from the photo becomes a symbol of a culture that has always brought together (and still brings together) people of Jewish nationality scattered across different generations and around the world.
The project was initiated by the Mariana Veriofkin Society,
The project was funded by the Lithuanian Culture Council