Abstrakcijos ir individualybės link: tautinio žydų meno paieškos Rytų Europoje
Towards abstraction and individuality: research into the jewish national art

Summary/Abstract: In the Eastern Europe, the concept of the jewish national art was variable. Historical and political developments, influenced by national movements, decided on the changes in the Jewish art perceptions, its objectives and form. As far as by the end of the 19th century, the first generation of Jewish artists did not set their sights on creating national art. The purpose they pursued was "to serve art in the universal human sense of the world." In the first decade of the 20th century the interest in jewish national art notably increased. East European Jewish community's self-identification was determined by close interaction with the local life, which fact decided on artists' turning to an everyday life genre. Thus the truthful depiction of the jews' everyday life has become one of the criteria, applying to the jewish national art. For most of the jewish artists of that time it meant exploiting the jewish thematic. Artists would go on expeditions to shtetls, which fact encouraged better understanding of folklore and collocating folk plots and ethnographic themes with modern artistic language and innovatory expression techniques. From sacral art they learned simplicity, sincerity and expressivity. Religious Jewish symbols, signs, hebrew letters and words become very popular among the avant-garde artists. In the 19th century, under the influence of romanticism, Europe was borne away with middle and far east countries, their culture and art. Oriental tendencies exerted influence also on the creation of the eastern european artists. In their works they focused on ornamental elements and the formal artistic language. In the beginning of the 20th century it was popular among jewish artists, writers and actors to join into communities. Such activities induced better understanding of the concept jewish artist in the context of the yiddish literature and theatre. This union of art and literature decided on the fact that many jewish artists got engaged in book illustrating. Starting with the third decade of the 20th century, the young artists' generation, under the influence of modern trends in art and literature, started seeking for the national art origins not in the folklore, yiddish literature or theatre and their closest environment, but inside themselves. The main attention was focused on the artist’ s inward experiences and spiritual quest, which caused artists to look for the new forms of expression. Their creation redounded on cubism, suprematism and geometrical abstractionism, because, according to them, namely the non-figural art, by its conception, essence and form, is closest to the jewish thinking, influenced, to a great extent, by the law, embodied in the second decalogue.

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