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Antanas

BIRTH

    Antanas Tamosaitis was born in the Barzdai village in Sakiai county on February 15, 1906.

EDUCATION

    In 1918-22, he studied at the Ziburio high school in Sakiai. In 1923, he entered the Fine Arts School of Kaunas, where he graduated in 1929. He studied painting under Justinas Vienozinskis (1886-1960) and graphics under Adomas Galdikas (1893-1969). He added depth to his knowledge of art at the studio of Mstislavas Dobuzinskis (1875-1957).

JOBS

    1929-31: Lecturer at the Fine Arts School of Kaunas.
    1931-40: Director of the folk art and domestic industry section of the Chamber of Agriculture at Dotnuva.
    1940-42: Lecturer and director of the Department of Education at the Vilnius Acadamy of Art.
    1942-44: Head of the decorative textile department of the Kaunas Institute of Applied Art.
    1945-46: Head of his own art studio at Glasenbache, Austria.
    1946-49: Head of the decorative textile department at the Ecole des Arts et Metiers in Freiburg, Germany.
    1949-50: Director of the YMCA Academy of Arts and Crafts in Montreal, Canada.

FOLK ART AND NATIONAL COSTUME

    During the summers of 1926-1939, Antanas organized expeditions into the countryside to collect folk art and to study the techniques of village weavers. His collections were exhibited at the M. K. Ciurlionis gallery and the Chamber of Agriculture Folk Art museum in Kaunas. Antanas studied the regional differences in Lithuanian dress and was instrumental in popularizing the idea of the Lithuanian national costume.

HIS ART

    In 1925, together with another artist, Antanas Samuolis (Samulevicius) (1899-?), Antanas Tamosaitis decorated a church at Vandziogala. As part of a competition to design a emblem for Federation Ateitis, he submitted the winning design. He illustrated the 1929 poetry book by Liudas Gira (1884-1946) Silko Gijos (Silken Threads) and designed the ex libris for graphic artist and art historian Paulius Galaune (1890-?). He designed the costumes for Pagirenai, an opera by Stasys Simkus (1887-1943) that premiered at the State Theater in Kaunas in 1942, and for the National Philharmonic ensemble's 1941-42 season.

    After 1950, Antanas devoted himself to painting, oil and water colors, and lithography in his own studio near Kingston, Ontario. "Tamosaitis' iconographic themes are clearly based upon motifs and images found in Lithuanian folklore as well as upon specific motifs employed in actual works of folk art. Thus his portrayal of thatched cottages, crosses, and wayside chapels that may be seen in the Lithuanian countryside and his inclusion of trees-of-life, birds, solar motifs, and rosettes derived from the recurrent motifs in folk art. The style of his works, however, represents a synthesis of modern abstraction in structure and composition and of traditional Lithuanian textile art in use of color and line."[1]

EXHIBITIONS

    His first exhibition of tapestries was held in the Culture Museum in Kaunas in 1936. He won gold medals for his tapestries at the International Exposition in Paris in 1937, Berlin in 1938, and New York in 1939.

    After 1950, he participated in many group shows and has had several one-man shows of his oils, lithographs, and water colors in Canada and in the United States.

PUBLICATIONS

    Between 1931-39 he published thirteen studies on Lithuanian folk art.

    Co-author with his wife Anastazija, Lithuanian National Costume, Lithuanian Folk Art Institute, Toronto, Canada, 1979.

    Lithuanian Easter Eggs, Lithuanian Folk Art Institute, Toronto, Canada, 1982.

    Co-author with his wife Anastazija, Lithuanian Sashes, Lithuanian Folk Art Institute, Toronto, Canada, 1983.

SOURCES

    [1] Encyclopedia Lituanica, volume V, edited by S. Suziedelis and A. Kucas, So. Boston, Mass., 1976, pp. 364-5.
    [2] H. Nagys, Lietuviu Enciklopedija, volume 30, edited by J. Puzinas, Lietuviu Enciklopedijos Leidykla, S. Boston, Mass., 1964, pp. 322-324.
    [3] Lietuviu Enciklopedija, volume 37, edited by S. Suziedelis, J. Gimbutas, S. Backaitis, A. Maziulis, and D. Bindokiene, Lietuviu Enciklopedijos Leidykla, S. Boston, Mass., 1985, p. 587.

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