Stasys Uà ¡inskas (20 July 1905 – 14 June 1974) was a Lithuanian artist of multiple creative fields: modern painting, stained glass, scenography, animation, puppetry and decorative glass artworks. He is widely regarded as the "father of Lithuanian stained glass art".
Stasys Uà ¡inskas was born in Pakruojis, a city situated in northern Lithuania, to a family of stonebreaker Juozas Uà ¡inskas, his mother Sofija Uà ¡inskaitàand his siblings Filomena, Romas, Alfonsas. Between 1908 (1909?) and 1914, the family lived in the United States. In 1914, Stasys returned to Lithuania and in 1925 graduated from the à  iauliai Gymnasium. Between 1925 and 1929 he studied painting in Kaunas Art School and frequented the art studio of . Following the 1929 student strike, Justinas Vienoà ¾inskis and encouraged Uà ¡inskas to continue his studies in Paris.
In 1929âÂÂ1931, Uà ¡inskas studied at the Académie Julian and later attended lectures by Henri-Marcel Magnehttps://journals.openedition.org/lha/217 at the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers (National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts). In 1930, Aleksandra Ekster has encouraged Uà ¡inskas to join the Académie Moderne where he attended EksterâÂÂs lectures on scenography, Fernand LégerâÂÂs lectures on painting and Le CorbusierâÂÂs abstract composition. Stasys Uà ¡inskas has later remembered his formative years in Paris in the following words : <blockquote>Having had come to Paris without a grant, I had to undertake a variety of additional jobs: I drew cinema posters, later I worked as a scenographer in the theatre âÂÂFolies BergèreâÂÂ. There I met theatre scenographer Aleksandra Ekster â she created decorations and costumes for some plays. Thanks to her, I got into the Académie Moderne, for which I had to pay 300 franc per month (otherwise I wouldnâÂÂt have been able to study [there] without the salary received from the given [theatrical] projects).
At the time, LégerâÂÂs painting was a novelty. It has immediately enticed my interest, I turned towards that path- and pursued it. Whereas Classical painting became mundane, he [Léger] created a foundation for a new composition. àArrangement of colors, composition in LégerâÂÂs artworks is not very complicated, merely simplified, however he attains a clear decorative, monumental, expressive construction. He used to say: âÂÂDonâÂÂt go to museums, donâÂÂt visit them, run from them, rather go to the shops, observe window-casesâ¦â F. Léger was not preoccupied with atmosphere, perspective, but with plane, constructive issues. While teaching the drawing, he claimed that you cannot isolate drawing because painting is a synthesis of a color and composition.</blockquote>S. Uà ¡inskas' final graduation work included a project of decorations and costumes for Sophocles' tragedy "Oedipus Rex" and Shakespeare's drama "Othello".<blockquote>Stasys Uà ¡inskas, having absorbed the expressions of constructionism, cubism, neoclassicism and Art Deco into historical, allegorical, genre painting and portraiture, embodied the spirit of his time, modernised the shapes of his works and kept in step with the world art avant-garde.</blockquote>In 1931, Uà ¡inskas returned to Lithuania and organized the first solo exhibitions in Kaunas and à  iauliai. His scenography works drew interest of , the director of the State Theater, who invited Uà ¡inskas to work in the theater. S. Uà ¡inskas also worked with Lithuanian writer Balys Sruoga and the famous Russian actor and director Mikhail Chekkov.
In 1932, Uà ¡inskas designed numerous performances in drama, opera and ballet theaters. In 1934, Uà ¡inskas became a professor at Kaunas Art School and taught monumental painting, stained glass and scenography design. Between 1935 and 1940, Uà ¡inskas manages a decorative painting studio at Kaunas Art School. Uà ¡inskas took over the leadership of the studio and soon became an authority in set design, demanding that his students master constructive thinking and logic in design, and emphasizing the importance of new technologies, also instructing students in the proper exhibition of artistic works.
In 1935, Uà ¡inskas created a number of marionettes for the first Lithuanian puppet play Silvester Fife (Silvestras Dà «delÃÂ) directed by Antanas Gustaitis and in 1938 for the first Lithuanian sound animation The Fat-Man's Dream (Storulio sapnas).According to AudronàGirdzijauskaitÃÂ: <blockquote>Uà ¡inskas seems to be looking for a universal space that would equally suit a dramatic or musical piece by interpreting, improvising and playing. He was preoccupied with the issues of figure and object within space. Uà ¡inskas took deep interest in the prehistory of theatrical puppets and masks. Having created unique dynamic marionettes of constructive shape and large size, and establishing a puppet show in 1936, he became the initiator of a professional Lithuanian puppet theatre.</blockquote>A year later (1937), Uà ¡inskas received gold and silver medals at the Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne for scenography design of Balys Dvarionas ballet Matchmaking (1933).
In 1937, Uà ¡inskas traveled to New York to organize the solo exhibition at the Roger Smith Gallery. During this year, Uà ¡inskas received a patent for the sketches of marionettes and used it for the creation of puppets. He also created decorations and costumes for the August Strindberg's play The Bridal Crown (in the Broadway Theater) and Euridipes' The Trojan Women. He created two puppets and decorations for the Broadway Theatre play The Nightingale (based on the tale by Hans Christian Andersen), however the creative work was interrupted by World War II.
In 1938, Uà ¡inskas returned to Lithuania and finalized the creation of puppets for the first Lithuanian short film with sound effects The Fat-Man's Dream based on the puppetoon technique. The novel technology of Uà ¡inskas' puppets allowed to flexibly move various body parts, express certain emotions and traits of the characters from the story.
In 2019, 'Uà ¡inskas' puppet film The Fat-Man's Dream and collection of puppet sketches were inscribed onto the Lithuanian National Memory of the World Register' by the UNESCO.
After the return from studies in Paris, Uà ¡inskas created the first stained-glass pieces for the Church of Vytautas the Great in Kaunas. à ½ydrà «nas MirinaviÃÂius describes the formative influence of studies in Paris felt in Uà ¡inskas artworks such as Saint (1931): <blockquote>This work in its character and spirit is close to stained-glass art of Romanesque period, though its stylisation evokes French modernists' constructivist thinking of the beginning of the 20th century.</blockquote>Stasys Uà ¡inskas continues working with stained-glass and creates numerous pieces for public places in Lithuania and later in Russia, some of which:
<nowiki></nowiki>The stained-glass pieces evoke a variety of stylistic influences such as Art Deco, Cubism, Constructivism, with Gothic, Renaissance and Classicism details, under which Stasys Uà ¡inskas developed traditional, historical and Lithuanian literature narratives.<nowiki></nowiki>
<nowiki></nowiki>In 1950, Uà ¡inskas began scientific and technical experiments with stained-glass formed a low-temperature and was the first in Lithuania to produce mirror and block stained glass. Uà ¡inskas, already known for his work in the interwar period, was forced by circumstance and a loss of commissions to begin experimenting at the Aleksotas glass factory, where he set up his own small workshop equipped with a small, liquid fuel-fired furnace. There, he created low-fire fine glass works: vases, plates, aquarium bowls, lamps, and small glass figurines.<nowiki></nowiki>
<nowiki></nowiki>Uà ¡inskas decorated his creations using stained glass painting techniques: employing silicate paints (glazes), enamels, metal film, gilding and silver plating. Flaws in the furnace's construction often led to contamination of the molten glass, but glazing would usually cover up shoddy glass. Initially, Uà ¡inskas used the supply of paints that he had brought with him from Paris, and later turned to mixing his own glazes.<nowiki></nowiki>
In 1950âÂÂs and 1960âÂÂs, Stasys Uà ¡inskas created decorative glass vessels including vases and decorative plates. <blockquote> Glass vases were usually painted with glaze and enamel paint, covered with a metal sheet, and sometimes gilded or silvered. These pieces are notable for streamline silhouettes of vessels, majestic forms, contrast between glass material and décor as well stylistically varied painting which resulted from both the influences that impacted Uà ¡inskasâ pre-war creative works and the realities of the Lithuanian fine arts in the 1950âÂÂs and 1960âÂÂs.</blockquote><nowiki></nowiki>As an instructor at the Kaunas Institute for Applied and Decorative Arts, Uà ¡inskas trained many talented artists whose later works would bring renown to Lithuanian stained glass artistry: Algimantas Stoà ¡kus, Kazimieras Morkà «nas, Vladas Jankauskas, Vytautas Banys, Rita GabrÃÂnaitÃÂ, and RachilàKrukaitÃÂ. His student Algimantas Stoà ¡kus remembers<nowiki></nowiki>:<blockquote>Uà ¡inskas impressed us with his personality, his teaching method ("understand form, then try to render it"), and his personal workshop. There, he had his own small wood-fired furnace where students could fire their glasswork for academic projects. My life turned to stained glass because of my training with Uà ¡inskas. </blockquote>During the work in Aleksotas glass factory, Stasys Uà ¡inskas was often assisted by his sister Filomena Uà ¡inskaitàand other students, one of them was his second wife Vitalija Blaà ¾ytà(1926âÂÂ1999) who will become an important collaborator in a variety of glass artworks and a muse for Stasys Uà ¡inskas' stained-glass pieces and paintings.
âÂÂIn Paris, teacher H. M. Magne and his milieu cultivated the perception of monumentality and the skills of drawing construction which inclined Uà ¡inskas to constructive principles, emphasis on drawing architectonics and rigid compositional structures.âÂÂ
âÂÂFrom Ekster Uà ¡inskas picked up laconic expression, synthesized shapes and the sense of structurally worked out spaces. Uà ¡inskas tied in his teacherâÂÂs scenographic experience with painting by seeking constructive clarity, and static and dynamic synthesis of rhythm.âÂÂ
âÂÂUnlike Léger, he was not impressed by the objects of machinery, though both were close in terms of going into details, combinations of decorative lines and shapes, and dynamic contrasts. Owing to Léger,àUà ¡inskas succeeded in escaping the âÂÂchamberâ style of painting that reigned in Lithuania, while treating many standard themes unconventionally.âÂÂ
The formative influence of the Parisian teachers could be observed in a number of Uà ¡inskasâ drawings and paintings of âÂÂmulti-figured and monumental compositionsâ depicting âÂÂsportive bodies, balanced proportions, movements, complex perspectives and sculptural dimensionsâ such as Spring (plafond for the Kaunas Aviation House) 1937; Music (plafond for the Broadway Theatre) 1938, Circus Rehearsal ('Cirko Repeticija') 1938-1945, Aviator's Dream (Lakà «no Sapnas) 1939.
Since the Soviet occupation of Lithuania in 1939, Lithuanian artists were placed under a pressure of the Soviet UnionâÂÂs political propaganda. As an avant-garde artist, Stasys Uà ¡inskas had to balance his artworks between the soviet ideology forced by the instructions and the artistic principles.
âÂÂTheir maneuvering between official and private lives, between the public and the personal, brought new discoveries as well as new lows of conformism.â One of the examples in Stasys Uà ¡inskas work is A Midsummer Night's Dream (Vasaros Nakties Sapnas, 1938) in which appears his wifeâÂÂs Vitalija Blaà ¾ytÃÂâÂÂs portrait like compositions. In her personal notes Vitalija Blaà ¾ytàwrites:<blockquote>The idea was born long time ago. The first time He was reading ShakespeareâÂÂs âÂÂA Midsummer Night's Dreamâ while traveling on a boat across the Atlantic. I remember that He read it again before starting [to work on a painting]. This work was realised after we have experienced our own âÂÂmidsummer night's dreamâÂÂ. The painting was intended to be executed in a Cubist style, but under the new circumstances He was forced to realise it in a form of Realism. Like with every large-scale work, He began by studying every figure with a model, I posed to Him for the central figure.</blockquote>The publication of Stasys Uà ¡inskas letters to his wife Vitalija Blaà ¾ytàwho was exiled to SiberiaâÂÂs gulags between 1940 and 1957 reveal the life in a post-war Lithuania and the details of Stasys Uà ¡inskas work specifics, professional life. In the letters, Uà ¡inskas also mentions his students Vytautas Cipljauskas, Sofija Veiverytàand Kazys Varnelis whose early works evoke strong Uà ¡inskasâ influence.