Algimantas Kunčius

Algimantas Kunčius
Visual Scripts

The name and, we are sure, the work of Algimantas Kunčius are well known to our audience. Over recent decades, there was perhaps not a single compilation of Lithuanian photography that did not contain works by him. He is also approached very often when an archive photograph of some cultural figure is needed. There have been numerous monographs about him and exhibitions of his work, and he has received numerous important awards. His image bank of the last century seems boundless and inexhaustible. Perhaps this is why his work is fragmented in our minds: portraits of cultural figures, old Vilnius, the lost life of the countryside in Sundays, the architecture of memory frozen in the series Reminiscences, and heartfelt views of Lithuania's horizons, not to mention the grimace of late Soviet construction sites, the reconstructed Gediminas Avenue, or the cobbles of clouds in the sky above the Vilnius district of Pašilaičiai. These and many other shards of images, so to speak, seem to belong to different 'archival vessels'. It is difficult to arrange them in a coherent order, let alone perceive them as the fairly consistent creative progress of a single artist. Nevertheless, in the exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, we connect these fragments into a narrative, which presents an extraordinary personality of our culture, the photographer Algimantas Kunčius, and his rich creative journey.

Curated by Ieva Mazūraitė-Novickienė

Exhibition lenders: Lithuanian Art Museum, National Museum of Lithuania, Modern Art Center (Vilnius), Šiauliai Aušra Museum, Lithuanian Photographers Association, Lithuanian Photographers Association Kaunas Department

Sponsors: Lithuanian Council for Culture, Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania, AB Lietuvos geležinkeliai, JSC Mineraliniai vandenys, Exterus, UAB Ekspobalta

Media Sponsors: Lietuvos rytas, lrytas.lt