Fotografas Kazys Lukšys ir jo veikla Pietų Lietuvoje
LTReikšminiai žodžiai: Kazys Lukšys; Fotografai; Pietų Lietuva; Kazys Lukšys; Photographers; Southern Lithuania.
ENThe article presents a short biography of a US citizen, photographer, and film operator, Kazys Lukšys, and an overview of his photographic activities. Kazys Lukšys was born in 1892, in Vazgirdonys village, Lithuania. In 1910 he arrived in the United States, worked at a coal mine, served in the army during the First World War, and at the end of the war, he studied. He acquired specialities of an electrician, and a cinema operator. He travelled around Lithuanian colonies in the US showing films with Lithuanian subtitles. Having acquired a camera K. Lukšys came to Lithuania. Here, he created documentaries, which he brought to the United States and showed them to the compatriots. K. Lukšys created over 100 documentary films about Lithuanian events. He also photographed Lithuanian sights, and sold the photographs to the compatriots in America. In 1928, having borrowed a loan, he built a house in Raseiniai where he lived with his family, founded the cinema Romuva, a film studio K. Lukšys ir Ko (K. Lukšys and Co.), and opened a hotel. During the period of 1922-1940 K. Lukšys arrived in Lithuania 15 times, he showed the documentaries about the life of his compatriots on the other shore on both sides of the Atlantic. His creative activity was interrupted by the Soviet occupation of Lithuania in 1940. On June 15 the Soviet government nationalized his home, seized his filming and photography equipment, and closed his companies. Before the breakout of the Second World War he managed to return to the United States. Unfortunately, his family members, after having requested to go to their husband and father, were accused of the Soviet "homeland" betrayal and imprisoned for a long time in the Siberian camps. K. Lukšys died in 1963 Santa Monica, California. The photographic K. Lukšys' heritage rarely reached the Soviet annexed Lithuania and was not proclaimed.And only after the liberation of Lithuania in 1990 owing to K. Bačkevičius, the collectors of the Lithuanian National Museum, the National M. Mažvydas Library, the Raseiniai History Ethnographic Museum, the author managed to get about 400 photographs of Lithuanian sights taken by K. Lukšys. This publication presents a part of the photographs taken by him in the regions of Dainava (Dzūkija) and Sūduva (Suvalkija) for the first time. [From the publication]
