Author: Vaitys Jonas, 1903 - 1963
Created: 1941.
Material / technique: oil on canvas.
Dimensions: 72.5x99 cm.
Signature: J Vaitys 41 (in the bottom-right corner of the painting).
In the interwar period, Vaitys’ oeuvre was strongly influenced by Expressionism (this is reflected in the motifs and plastic expression). Impressionism was late to appear in his paintings, but it did after 1940, intertwined with other trends of art: Postimpressionism, Expressionism and the so-called decorative synthetic Realism. In the years of war, Vaitys kept close communication with Vytautas Kairiūkštis and Adomas Galdikas who supported him in his artistic aspirations. His landscapes remained colourful and emotional: the artist was free in painting, aspired at harmonious colouring by joining the trees and meadows painted in fine vibrant brushstrokes into an artistic entirety which reflected the feelings raised by Lithuanian nature. He better succeeded with smaller pictures of sketchy nature. The artist was interested in a dynamic condition of nature when winter was followed by spring, summer by autumn, etc., or in a transitional state of nature, e.g. before a storm or in rain. Jonas Vaitys in particular liked to reflect the feelings raised by nature in autumn: from the golden beauty of foliage when trees are dressed in colourful outfits until the last warm rays of sun in late autumn.
Reference: Lithuanian painting. Introduction by Pranas Gudynas. Vilnius: Vaga, 1976; XX a. History of Lithuanian art in the 20th century. 1900–1940. Vilnius: Vaga, 1983, vol. 2, p. 121–123; XX a. History of Lithuanian art in the 20th century. 1940–1960. Vilnius, 1990, vol. 3; Valiukševičiūtė, Kaunas Institute of Art. Book 2. Kaunas, 2002, p. 155–157; Jonas Vaitys. Text by Nijolė Tumėnienė. Vilnius: Publication and Information Centre of the Artists’ Association, 2003.