Day 31. Pilaitė. Part II. A winter walk in Sudervėlė valley

#Pilaitė

#Sudervėlė

Series of #WalksinVilnius


We had a beautiful winter this year on Palm Sunday in my dearest Pilaite.

As this winter lasted for 2 days, I couldn't miss the opportunity to have a nice winter walk. 

I start my walk by going towards the Salotes Lake. You can stop near the lake or go further to the so called Pilaite Forest.

I always go to the forest to the hill where a beautiful view on a stream (little river) Sudervėlė  and the Sudervėlė valley discloses. Sudervele, rising in swampy meadows near Zujunai, is a right tributary of the Neris River.

the Sudervėlė Valley

Sudervėlė Valley with Vilnius TV Tower in Karoliniškės in a background

This hill, in my opinion, is a perfect place for kids sledding.

Usually I go down the hill and cross the Sudervele and go towards Karoliniškės.

However, on this Sunday the water in Sudervėlė was quite high so I couldn't cross the stream.

For me - a perfect winter view with a stream

 I walked along the right bank of Sudervėlė till the first living hose on Rojaus str. and I came back. Beside a high level of water I've noticed that Sudervele was quite polluted that day :(

A totally windless place

But the forest was still exremely calm and beautiful.

Future Visions. Episode I. Vilnius News: Decision about the place of a future monument to Jonas Basanavicius

series of #FutureVisions

As www.15min.lt informes, today, Vilnius City Municipality council has taken a decision that a future monument to a patriarch of a nation dr. Jonas Basanavičius will be erected on a square in front of Lithuanian National Philharmony on Ausros Vartu str.

Vilnius City Municipality photo / Monument to Jonas Basanavicius

Lithuanian National Philharmony at night

Decision was taken this year, when we celebrate 165th birthday of Jonas Basanavicius.

City municipality has formed a special working group which was dealing with that issue. Decision was taken with taking into consideration opinion of Vilnius residents, representatives of Lithuanian Artists' Association and Lithuanian Architects' Association. 

This place was chosen because it is from historical and cultural as well as from urbanistic and architectural perspective the most closely connected with social and pilitcal activity of Jonas Basanavicius. 

Konstantinas Sirvydas Square, proposed by Lithuanian National Museum and  was rejected as a place for a future monument because it is urbanistically inconvienient. 

Day 30. Pilaitė Part II. News. Pilaite Parish plans and projects for the future.

#Pilaitė

My dearest Pilaitė has its own parish with a church - St. Joseph Church.

Well, I always used to think that it is a churcj but it turned out to be only a chapel. Therefore Pilaite parish priests as well as parishioners had a dream to construct a church for 15 years already.
Their dream is starting to become true. The construction of a new church has begun.

On March 19, on St Joseph's Day, a Ceremony of Laying Foundation Stone ( or Conerstone) fo the future church took place. The Foundation Stone is layed in the place of future central altar.

Place of Foundation Stone (on March 18)

 

Foundation Stone of a future Saint Joseph Church 

Architects of the future Saint Joseph Church  are Kęstutis Akelaitis, Gintaras Čaikauskas and Marius Šaliamoras ( info: here).

Visualization of the future church - here.

Crow of people going to the chapel on a Palm Sunday (March 20)

Day 29. Opera ONEGIN by D. Ibelhauptaitė at Vilnius Congress Hall

series of #VilniusINdoors

For the first time in my life I went to the opera. And Iwent not to the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre, but to the opera performed by Vilnius City Opera and Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra at Vilnius Congress Hall.

I went to Opera Onegin composed by Caikovsky, story based on the novel in verse by Alexander Pushkin.

 Lensky. Photo taken from http://www.tiketa.lt

Onegin by Vilnius City Opera and Dalia Ibelhauptaitė

Location:

Vilnius Congress Hall.

Creators:

Director - Dalia Ibelhauptaitė
Conductor - Gintaras Rinkevičius
Scenography - Dick Bird
Costumes  - Juozas Statkevičius
Lighting designer  - Peter Mumford

Decoration before 2nd Act

Time: March 18 - 20, 2016
Tickets: starting from 13,20 EUR

As delfi.lt states Onegin creators only few days before the performance faced a seriuos problem concerning the artist who had to permorm the main roles: Onegin and Tatyana. They fell sick therefore new artists had to be found in a very short time. Both perfomers of the roles of Onegin and Tatyana were brought from Germany.

Perfomers:
Onegin - Jurij Samoilov (borrowed from Germany, Oper Frankfurt)
Tatyana - Vida Mikneviciute (borrowed also from Germany, Mainz)
Olga  - Jurgita Adamonyte
Lensky - Edgaras Montvidas
Commander Zaretsky - Tadas Girininkas
Trique - Rafailas Karpis
Mrs Larina - Sigute Stonyte
Nanya - Irena Milkevičiūtė

This season Vilnius City Opera repertoire consisted of 5 perfomances:

The Troubadour  - opera by g. Verdi
Pelléas and Mélisande - opera by C. Debussy
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street - muscical by S. Sondheim (as I have heard absolutely amazing show)
Onegin - described here
and
Tosca - opera by G. Puccinni

To sum up everything I can say I've liked the opera Onegin very much.

Day 28. Fashion Infection 2016.

Mados Infekcija (Fashion Infection) festival, in my oppinion, is the most importanat fashion event in Vilnius (Lithuania).

This year on 18th - 19th of March, on the 18th festival, 16 collections of Lithuanian and foreign designers were presented (programme).

Paulius Gasiūnas photo / Fashion Infection 2016 Poster.

Source: elaima.lt

Festival LOCATION (as usually): Contemporary Art Centre

Time: 18th - 19th March, 2016

Tickets: 21 - 51 EUR.

All the news from the festival on elaima.lt 

Final word of mine

I've never been on this fashion festival and I strongly doubt if I ever go there, but I have to write about this, because it is definitely important Vilnius event, if not the most imortant event of that kind in Lithuania.

Ukrainian Oryol i Reshka in Vilnius

I've found this video on youtube today just accidentally

Oryol i Reshka turned out to be a Ukrainian TV travel series that is broadcasted in Russian in Ukraine, but also in Russia.

At first I thought that it will a perfect propaganda video about Vilnius made by people who can not accept the the fact that Lithuania is not a part of CCCP ( USSR) for 26 years already.

But no. I was so wrong. It is absolutely positive video, made in 2013 on the night the culture night festival Kulturos naktis (Culture Night) took place.

Enjoy watching! (in Russian) :)

Day 27. Kaziukas Fair 2016. #VilniusFestivals

#VilniusFairs

#VilniusFestivals

All about Kaziukas Fair or Saint Casimir's Fair here.
The grand popular annual fair is widely called by people simply Kaziukas.
This year Fair toook place on March 04 - 06.
Official programme of Kaziukas Fair 2016 - here.

traditional Kaziukas Chair at the beginning of 

Gediminas avenue in front of the Cathedral

Wood Handicraft

Traditional wooden spoons

Wooden Handicraft with wooden Pensive Christ (Rūpintojėlis)

created by Lithuanian wood carvers called Dievdirbiai

kind of fair gate decorated with Traditional woven sashes

Metal handicraft and a wonderfull lamp for 1,400 EUR :)

 The Sauna Yard

Hay Handicraft by Polish artists

Paintings by Lithuanian artists

The fair could be described in several words: crowds of people, verbos, variuos gingerbreads (but not the Christmas ones), bubliks ( OMG, this word does really exist also in English!!! it means riestainis or baronka), hundreds of craftsmen, crowds of people and one more time crowds of people.

Fair organizers ( among them Mr. Vytenis Urba) summarize the results of the fair - here ( but in Lithuanian).

My Kaziukas Fair  2016 Shopping results

My verba - Easter Egg, ( I just love it)

A Wooden Flower

Modern version of traditional basket for potatoes picking

Also, I don't know why but Urban Adventures put the festival on the TOP7 coolest annual festivals in Vilnius

Day 26. Vilnius Book Fair 2016.

#VilniusFairs

17th International Vilnius Book Fair  was held on February 25-28, 2016 in LITEXPO.
It's the biggest event of that kind in the Baltic States.

They say that each year it's attended by more than 60,000 visistors.
But I would say that even more...
I've visited the fair on Saturday.... see below:

Fiction and specialized literature hall

DO YOU?

Children's literature hall

The King Mindaugas & The Grand Duke Gediminas by TYPOART

in the Scientific and refrence literature hall

Amazing works by TYPOART and it's artist

Gediminas Leonavičius and Jūratė Rutkauskaitė

one of the stages in the Music hall 

At 1 p.m. I have attended the presenting the novel Maranta ( in Lithuanian) 

by Birutė Jonuškaitė (in Lithuanian)  (Lithuanian Writers' Union Publishers) 

with the author: Saulius Vasiliauskas and a writer Donaldas Kajokas 

Birute Jonuskaite reading excerpt from her novel Maranta

Admission: 1 day single ticket - 5 EUR ( since I am fast a turtle I couldn't manage to buy this ticket for 4 eur) :) 

Day 25. National Gallery of Arts. EXHIBITION THE MAN WITH SAUKA'S FACE. Sarunas Sauka Paintings 1978 - 2015 at Vilnius National Art Gallery

#NDG

#Vilniusgallery
#VilniusMuseums

One of the questions of my question series called: What kind of Vilnietis (aka a Vilnius resident) you are if you ....?

here it comes....
So: What kind of Vilnietis you are if you haven't visited Sauka's Exhibition?

oh dear...

EXHIBITION: The Man with Sauka’s Face painting by Šarūnas Sauka
LOCATION: National Gallery of Arts (Vilnius museum # ??)
Admission fee: 1,80 EUR

The National Gallery of Arts is situated on the right bank of Neris River in the newly developed centre of Vilnius. The first building of the National Gallery of Arts was designed by the architects Gediminas baravykas and Vytautas Vielius, and was build in 1980. The reconstruction and extension to the National Gallery of Arts was undertaken by Audrius Bučas, Darius Čaplinskas and Gintaras Kuginis in 2005 - 2009.

The National Gallery of Arts displays 20th and 21st-century Lithuanian paintings, sculpture, graphic art, photography and contemporary art from Lithuania and abroad.

The National Gallery of Arts also has a multipurpose auditorium for conferences and cultural events, an education centre, information centre, bookshop and cafe.
(info taken from a ticket)

Official exhibition poster

The exhibition has got a lot of public attention, and, I dare to say, advertising.

Delfi states (in Lithuanian) that solely on January 16 exhibition was visited by 1170 guests!

Oooopsss.....Sorry for repeating myself

The same on Sunday  (February 28) - a crowd of people. A queue to get a ticket, a queue to hang a coat and a crowd of people in front of each painting.

And here come some paintings:

A Temple

as far as I remenber: Murder at a Restaurant

one of the creepiest: Group Entertainment

I like that: A Man with Problems 

(reminds me myself, although it's not clear 

if these are Problems or some kind of Bugs)

More about the exhibition, but in Lithuanian here and here.
Artist's daughter Monika Saukaite, who is also the coordinator of the exhibition, talking about Sauka's paintings ( only in Lithuanian).

Other temporary exhibition: Light in the Darkness by Birute Stancikaite

Summer

The National Gallery of Arts is a part of Lithuanian Art Museum, a permanent exhibition is located there.

 I'm a fan of realism so here come my favourite realistic paintings:

Piligrims in the Vilnius Calvary by Pranciskus Jurjevicius (in Lithuanian)

as I remember A view from the Gediminas Hill by Viktoras Vizgirda

Panorama by Antanas Gudaitis

View of Bernardine Church from Vilnele river by V. Vizgirda

Samogitian Women by Antanas Gudaitis

Panorama of Vilnius from Tauras hill by Michał Rouba

a beautiful painting .....

 but I can't decipher neither name nor the artist

our dearest Žemaitė also sits in the permanent exhibition

Although I didn't like Sauka much, I just loved the permanent exhibition with it's realism and I admired the spacious halls of the gallery.