Landscape with Pine Trees
Landscape with Pine Trees

Landscape with Pine Trees

Author: Mackevičius Vytautas, 1911 - 1991

Created: 1971.

Material / technique: oil on canvas.

Dimensions: 70x90 cm.

Signature: V M (in the bottom-right corner of the painting).

Vytautas Mackevičius (1911–1991) painted ideological pictures in the Soviet period, but he disliked them and felt much freer when he was painting landscapes. He lived in the greenest part of Antakalnis, on Pavasario (Spring) Street, which was full of good material for an artist. He painted the landscape of his own yard, with pine trees and flower beds. The city here becomes an integral part of nature and modern painting. The play of the white clouds in the blue sky, the pine trees caressed by the wind, and the clumps of fruit trees and multi-coloured flowers, all turn into shimmering and stirring colours, strokes and patches, thus producing a happy work portraying a summer’s day. This landscape represents the Lithuanian school of colourist painting, and is one of the best works by Mackevičius. Landscape with pine trees was appreciated by the artist himself, and he chose it as the reproduction for the cover of a monograph about him (Pranas Gudynas, Vytautas Mackevičius, Vilnius: Vaga, 1971).

Reference: Art album "Vilnius. Topophilia" (Volume I). Compiled by L. Laučkaitė. Vilnius, LAWIN, 2014, I Vol. P. 328.

This is one of the best Post-Impressionist works by Mackevičius. He recognised this himself: he proposed to reproduce it on the cover of his monograph, and would not sell it to any museum. The spontaneous element of nature is skilfully rendered. By means of a combination of contrasting colours and the expressiveness of the shapes, Mackevičius created an image full of pulsating vitality and a feeling of the unity of the earth and the expanse of the sky.

Reference: Art album "The World of Landscapes" (Volume II). Compiled by N. Tumėnienė. Vilnius, LAWIN, 2013. P.91.

Published: Art album "Vilnius. Topophilia" (Volume I). Compiled by L. Laučkaitė. Vilnius, LAWIN, 2014, I Vol. P. 328;  Art album "The World of Landscapes" (Volume II). Compiled by N. Tumėnienė. Vilnius, LAWIN, 2013. P.91, Cat. No. 4, P. 91, P. 248;  Gudynas Pranas. "Vytautas Mackevičius". Vilnius: Vaga, 1971.