Kairiūkštytė Elvyra

Born 15 November 1950 in Vilnius.
Died 15 November 2006, buried in Vilnius, Kairėnai Cemetery. Graphic artist.
1971-1977 Studied graphic art at the State Institute of Art Participated in art exhibitions since 1979. Since 1984 – member of the Lithuanian Artists’ Union.

Bibliography:
The Burning Closeness of Life. Elvyra Kairiūkštytė (1950-2006), “Tyto alba”, 2010

Art critics’ insights:
Elvyra Kairiūkštytė (1950 – 2006) was not on the islands of Oceania like Emil Nolde or Max Pechstein. She would have traveled with them – the artists of the German expressionist group “Die Brücke”, wildly rejoicing in nature naked. She also loved all this and knew the primitive art of exotic lands. It was not for nothing that during her studies at the institute, due to her cubist, surrealist improvisations and temperament, she was called Kikasso. The artist had never traveled outside Lithuania, except for Oslo in the fall of 1990 with an exhibition of graphic works and a study trip to Italy in April 1998. The most important route on her travel map was between Vilnius and the Kuršėnai orphanage.

It was not travel that expanded the artist’s horizons, but art books, fiction and philosophical literature. In order to draw, carve images on linoleum, enriched with impressions of Australian aborigines, pre-Columbian American Indians or the works of Pablo Picasso, Edvard Munch, and other modernists, Elvyra had enough of wandering through the pages of art albums. As was the case for most artists during their years of affiliation.
If we were to dream about which corner of the globe Elvyra would have wanted to wander to – I would guess that it would be Polynesia, the Hawaiian archipelago, to the Tahitians or the Maori. There, where the paths of Paul Gauguin had meandered. After all, almost every sheet of her graphics exudes erotic interest and a longing for Paradise.

The artist’s extensive work constitutes an extremely valuable page in the history of Lithuanian graphics, which we still need to refine, supplement and become aware of with our minds and hearts. Elvyra’s enormous creative legacy consists of prints, about 11,000 large-format drawings, sketches, etc.