Stasis Krasauskas: biography, personal life, creativity

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

An article about the Lithuanian engraver, it briefly describes his life and work, revealing his vision of the world. The article describes the influence of the works of S. Krasauskas, the artist's biography, his personal life, recent years, as well as his legacy. The description of the linocut "Youth" is given, the cycle "Forever Alive" (1973-1975), the cycle of engravings "The Birth of a Woman" are considered. The awards and titles of the artist are described, as well as the features of the work of Stasys Krasauskas.

Influence of the artist's work

When the generation of the 60s and 70s is told about Stasys Krasauskas, not everyone remembers this artist, but it is enough to show a few of his works, as youth returns. His works were then beacons for young men and women into adulthood, which seemed to be full of romance, justice, kindness. That is why I remember very well the cover of "Youth" with a gentle, soft and kind girl's face in a halo of branches and leaves, and prints fromForever Alive series.

Biography of the artist-engraver

Stasis Krasauskas has a quite ordinary biography. Born on June 1, 1929 in the second largest city of Lithuania, Kaunas. He graduated from the Kaunas secondary school, then (1948-1952) studied at the Vilnius Institute of Physical Culture and Sports. Eight times he was the champion of the Lithuanian SSR in swimming, he easily won first places, swimming in different styles for different distances.

But the craving for art won. Stasys Krasauskas, an artist by spirit and gift, entered the Vilnius Art Institute of Lithuania and graduated with honors (1952-1958). Since 1961, he has been a teacher at the same institute.

Before thirty years old, Stasis Krasauskas is already gaining recognition as one of the best graphic artists in Lithuania. Artistic by nature, he tries and finds himself everywhere: he sings, plays in the theater, acts in films. He is also interested in journalism. And in all his endeavors, success awaited him, as if he had been studying and moving towards this for many years.

Private life

Stasis Krasauskas got married in 1953. His wife is a wonderful woman Niele Leshchu-Kaityte. It was she who was always there, more than once in the most different works of the master her image as a woman and mother was seen, it is precisely with feelings for her and children that his works are filled. Such women are called the muses of artists. Niele gave birth to two daughters to the artist: Rasa in 1955, and Aiste in 1960.

Legacy

Stasis Krasauskasengravings performed in different ways: he worked in the techniques of woodcuts, lithography, performed linocuts and etchings. His cutter owns easel engravings and illustrations for the works of the classics (Shakespeare's sonnets, Song of Songs). There are especially many engravings based on the works of contemporaries: Mezhelaitis, Marcinkevičius, and others. His legacy is a huge number of drawings. He is the author of a whole woodcut cycle illustrating the poems of J. Marcinkevičius, “Blood and Ashes” (1960), autozincographic works of the cycle “The Wall” (1969), woodcut illustrations for the book of poems by E. Mezhelaitis “Man” (1961-1962), engravings for the collections of E. Mezhelaitis "Cardiogram" and "Aviastudies", for the work of A. T. Venclova "Do you know that region?" (1964).

He illustrated the poem of his close friend Robert Rozhdestvensky "Requiem" (1961), voicing amazing lines of memory in vivid images.

The artist made illustrations for Shakespeare's "Sonnets" (1966) using autozincography technique. He did not leave his attention close to him in spirit and related to the biblical "Old Testament", filled with tender love "Song of Songs" of King Solomon. He also owns engravings for the poem "Vladimir Ilyich Lenin" by Vladimir Mayakovsky (1970).

Linocut "Youth"

The most famous work of Stasis is the linocut "Youth" (1961), it was taken by the magazine "Youth" as an emblem and really became the emblem of the youth of the 70-80s of the last century, like the famous drawing by Pablo Picasso of a woman with a dove - peace emblem. Green leaves are gently woven into the hair and face (although the engraving is black and white), everything seems young andgentle, making one whole. She is also depicted on the artist's tombstone.

It is possible and necessary to note the cycle from the series of engravings "Movement" (1971), where the author seems to be carried away by the movement and involved in the chaos of being.

Stassis Krasauskas' cycle "Forever Alive" (1973-1975)

“Struggle”, “Memory”, “Dreams”, “Life” - these, according to the custom of the artist, short and capacious designations of all parts of the cycle of engravings cover all stages of human life from birth to end, the circle is closed - “Forever alive.”

The prints of this cycle make everyone who has seen them stop and think. Viewers often call them "gloomy", many rarely watch the entire cycle in its entirety. But memory brings back these extraordinary works, returns to the need to remember those who gave their lives for a brighter future, so that children were born and raised, boys and girls loved each other, and life went on without wars and death of people.

The artist himself survived World War II when he was a child. The tragedy of the people involved in the chaos and horror of the war remained forever in his memory and in his works.

The cycle of prints by Stasis Krasauskas “Forever Alive” uses the theme of the fresco “The Sower” from Zelenopolye, Kaliningrad Region, created on the facade of the Berchersdorf Church by an unknown artist in memory of the soldiers who fell in the First World War.

Cycle of engravings "The Birth of a Woman"

At Stasis Krasauskas, the birth of a woman on the sheets of engravings is carried outslowly, gradually. On each sheet of autozincography there is a transformation: from ignorance to knowledge of oneself, to knowledge of motherhood as the main task, to understanding the meaning of life. The next stage of development is the transformation from youth to maturity, perfection, knowledge of the whole world.

The whole cycle is permeated with the epicurean joy of being, the joy of motherhood, but also the understanding of the ambiguity and complexity of life.

The woman of the cycle is a prototype of Eve. Reality and cosmos coexist, make friends, pour from form to form, walk hand in hand. It is the woman who personifies for Krasauskas such concepts as Beauty, Life and Eternity.

Awards and titles of the artist

The artist Stasis Krasauskas received the State Prize of the USSR in 1976 for the cycle "Forever Alive".

In addition, his paintings were repeatedly noted as the best, the artist was awarded the Order of the Badge of Honor, the Bronze Medal in Leipzig as an illustrator of the book "Man" by Eduardas Mezhelaitis.

Stasis Krasauskas receives the title of Honored Art Worker of the Lithuanian SSR (1968) and People's Artist of Lithuania (1977).

Features of work

One of the main features of the artist's work is conciseness. He chooses a line from all possible means of representation. From the whole color variety - the monochrome of white and black. And he creates engravings full of philosophical meaning, like Dürer, but without his multi-figured complexity, symbolism and sophistication. Everything is simple with him.

For simplicity and intelligibilityengravings of the master are closest to the traditions of Lithuanian folk culture: wooden carving and sculpture. They also gave expression, expressiveness and completeness to each line.

The engravings of the master are so similar to the drawings of antique amphoras and other dishes, where monochrome emphasizes the elegance of the line or contour of the picture. As on ancient amphoras, the artist depicts the world he knows with his own simple language. His lines are either smooth and unhurriedly gentle, or crumpled and sharp, like those of the expressionists (“Impulse” by Kollwitz and others), when they reflect the rigidity of the world and war. Peace and bliss in its cycles are suddenly replaced by the fragmentation and sharpness of wars, conflicts, human dramas that suddenly appeared.

In style, most of the master's works can be attributed to romanticism. Being himself, according to friends, a romantic, he remains true to himself in his works, poeticizes the surrounding reality, searches for and finds heroes and glorifies their exploits. Traveling was an integral part of the artist's life. The result of the impressions of his creative trips was the line of his prints made in 1966, where the Far East appears businesslike and diverse.

When you look at the paintings of Stasis Krasauskas, you involuntarily recall the works of Pablo Picasso, too much was taken from the master of painting, who did not get tired of experimenting with color and form all his life. But Picasso gave such a charge of energy with each of his new works that practically none of his contemporaries could escape his influence. Modigliani destroyed his works if he noticed the influence of Picasso in them. It is quite clear that the connection of a plane-linear systemKrasauskas and Pablo Picasso's systems for constructing a drawing and sculptural-volumetric systems traditional for European culture are similar.

Starting from the 1950s, especially in drawing, Stasys Krasauskas is increasingly showing his special style. Illustration occupies an increasing place in the artist's life, it allows to embody and rethink poetic lines into visible images. At the same time, the artist uses the traditions of fine art from ancient Egypt to the Renaissance, but also develops his own style more and more clearly. Particularly close to him are the works of the fusion of nature and man, their inseparability. Stasys Krasauskas fills his engravings with this feeling of belonging to the extraordinary and beautiful, for the existence of which people have to pay, sometimes at the cost of their own lives.

Last years of life

The artist has always been in the midst of new creative ideas and designs, has always been full of energy and active. As a real romantic, he tried all his life to understand the causes of human delusions, the essence and causes of cruelty. His life was like a flash, short and bright (he died at 47). Overcoming suffering in the name of love, in the name of the happiness of all mankind is the main line of the artist's work. S. A. Krasauskas died of laryngeal cancer on February 10, 1977 in Moscow at the P. A. Herzen Cancer Institute. He was buried at the Antaklnis cemetery in Vilnius. The tombstone of the artist is made in the form of linocut "Youth".