Open-air photographic exhibition “Lithuania to the world”

On May 18th, International Museum Day, the garden of the Historical Presidential Palace in Kaunas will welcome visitors adorned with its twentieth jubilee large-format archival photography exhibition. The exhibition "To the World About Lithuania" will tell the story of the efforts of the Lithuanian state, restored in 1918, to establish not only its existence but also its identity in the international arena. Archival photographs will reveal how Lithuania's image was shaped and which personalities were most prominent in "introducing" Lithuania to the world. On May 18th, at 12:00 PM and 2:00 PM, the exhibition's curator, historian and museologist Laurynas Blažys, will introduce the exhibition.

For Lithuania, which restored its statehood in 1918, it took considerable effort to become visible and heard. This complex mission was undertaken both on a state level and through the individual efforts of persistent Lithuanians. Nevertheless, our first attempts often "fell flat": Lithuanian diplomats were not invited to the most important conferences on the old continent, the country's first Olympians barely managed to reach Paris in 1924, and theater artists, having debuted in Riga, received ironic messages in the neighbors' press.

Despite a difficult start, Lithuanians learned from their mistakes and inexperience. By the end of the 1930s, Lithuania's heritage and its relationship with a modernizing society were perfectly represented by the works of Lithuanian artists and craftsmen at world exhibitions, Lithuanian-made aircraft gracefully carved the European skies, and basketball players even managed to step onto the highest podiums of international competitions.

Citizens and guests will be able to see how interwar Lithuania presented itself to the world in the garden of the Historical Presidential Palace starting May 18th. The exhibition "To the World About Lithuania" can be visited daily for free from 8:00 AM to 9:00 PM. The exhibition will be open in the garden until October 31st. For those who wish not only to see but also to hear stories about the representation of interwar Lithuania abroad, we invite you to book a tour with a guide.

On International Museum Night, May 23rd, the exhibition "To the World About Lithuania" will become a springboard for the game "How Lithuania Went to the World": teams will scatter from the garden throughout the city, searching for the world capitals and major cities encoded within it.

The exhibition is organized by the Historical Presidential Palace of the Republic of Lithuania in Kaunas and the National M. K. Čiurlionis Art Museum. The exhibition curator is historian Laurynas Blažys. The exhibition designer is Lina Mozūraitė. Friends of the exhibition include the Lithuanian Central State Archives, the National Museum of Lithuania, the Vytautas the Great War Museum, the Samogitian Museum "Alka", the Lithuanian Theatre, Music and Cinema Museum, the Joniškis Basketball Museum, and Giedrius Šniukas. The exhibition is part of the project "Citizens and the State: A Relevant Look at Aspects of Lithuania's Self-Creation". The project is partially funded by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania.