“"Why he? Why we are here talking to the well-known Lithuanian artist - the famous elder photographer - classic Antanas Sutkus?
    In our hobby group talking about Lithuanian photography our teacher's stories have intrigued us: in the past all parents wanted their children to be able to photograph 'like Sutkus'. Wow… That's enough to take notice of a man.
    And now he is in front of us. We'll try to talk (strictly speaking - listen intently). About his opinion of life, his works, our works in his view".
    Because of our age we don't know much about Lithuanian photography. However we know you as the famous artist, creative man, who has imprinted in Lithuanian photography, who with his coevals has created Lithuanian photography tradition.

    You're living in the world of 'great' photography, but have you noticed that such phenomena as students' photography exists? What do you think about it?

    Students' photography is only a start. But even at this start it can be told who attracts, beguiles by one's thinking, intuition, personality. A lot of your works have interested me (we asked A. Sutkus to comment some Lithuanian students' photography exibition works ). But they are rough. For example, the photograph of a girl and her dog. The girl is putting her mind to herself. But going for a walk with a dog is a contact, communication, not a romance, when dog doesn't exist. If she had really felt bad, she would have hugged her dog, not put head on her knees. There's some kind of direction, acting, I think.

    Everything has the start. It's a trivial question, but when have you taken interest in photography? Was it a joyfull, successful start or maybe it was painful?

    I started photographing when I was a student. I don't know if it was a fortuity. People say that all photography is considered a fortuity. And it happens to less than some thousands not fortuitous people.
    Nobody in my family photographed, and I didn't think about what it was. How I took the camera into my hands? Well, I just had it (he's smiling). I don't tell I was born with it but I have had it since eighth form.
    I attended a photography hobby group in Ežerėlis (A.Sutkus was studying in Ežerėlis secondary school). At first photos weren't good. My abilities were far from nowaday students' skills.
    However, photography was like a miracle to me: you put white paper into the developer and here you are… Photo is developing. Then photos were made in contact way: if the negative was 6x6 cm, a photo was the same size. We had fun, photographed girls….

    But why have you chosen photography, not any other kind of art?

    Well, I was good at writing. I wrote diaries… Later I quited it, started to photograph. I have been studying Russian for one year, later journalism. At the University I was a "Soviet student" newsman, added photos to the writings and later conversely. I realized, that photography is holding me: I photographed at days and developed, printing at nights. I physically had no time to study. I became an extra-mural student, so I have been studying in the university for a long time. My friends became the magistral staff, they suggested to set their name to my exams, but I didn't care about that. I was thinking only about the establishment of photo-artists society.

    You was talking about the fortuities in photography earlier. Did you always try to fix them by photographing, or had you any particular ideas?

    I think, that photography (i. e. my photography) is intuitive: I see a breathtaking person or place and photograph it.
    And the readiness may be literary only, it's enough. For example, I had liberal education. Before my illness (tuberculosis) I had read a lot, and when I got sick, the only thing that was left to me was reading. And what concerns photograpfy - I just wanted to photograph.

    There are Lithuanian people in your objective. You call your cycle alike. It was started very long ago and 'there is no end yet' (these words are from your internet site).
    There are lots of faces, characters, personalities around us. It seems to be not difficult to create a portrait, cycle, series. But why can't we make anything like that?
    Why do you always photograph people, not views?

    It is more interesting to photograph people (smiling). I photographed views, too. I have produced 4 books, for example "Lietuva iš paukščio skrydžio"("Lithuania- A - Bird's Eye View"). I was the first who photographed from a helicopter (I made artistic photos). When I was a student, I photographed from the roofs, chimneys, even from the Cathedral… I had even mobile cranes in my arsenal of working means… Once I was photographing the Cathedral from café "Literatai" roof and almost fell down…
    Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Some choose people, some nature, some architecture. Photography is some kind of diary. You convey what you feel and see. Now there are more facilities - we can use digital technique.
    When I was a schoolboy, we photographed each other. Or our teachers playing snowballs… When they saw the photo, they said it was a real fight - no snowballs could be seen.

    Had you the aim to fix amazing moments?

    At first no. It all have happened off-hand, spontaneously.

    We have heard, that you had been compared to Henri Cartier-Bresson (the famous XX century photographer). Is your standpoint similar to his?

    No. I am more humane, I hope. Bresson was too cold, but I like his works. He brought reportage closer to art. His style was perfect. However, I like Doisneau more. His style is not so perfect, but he is warmer, more humane. His love to people has always imposed on me.
    I am not against Bresson. Are there any similarities between us? Well, there was an incident when our works were not distinguished easily… I was 26 years old then. Jean Paul Sartre (French writer, philosopher existentialist) came to Lithuania. Poet Eduardas Mieželaitis asked me to join them. I was travelling with them through all Lithuania for five days: we were having breakfast, lunch, dinner together, we talked about literature a lot. One day the guest got interested in what I wrote: prose or poetry. I told him that I didn't write even anylove-letters, and added that I was a photographer. He shouted "Oh my God! I don't associate with photographers!" Nevertheless he asked how many talented photographers there were in Lithuania. I answered that there were five or six, me included. "So many for three millions? Lithuania is a rich country. There are ten times more people in France and we've got only one talented photographer!" (But it's true -Lithuania always has had good photographers).
    Photos of our meeting I sent to Sartre. He was very happy, later published my works in his books and indicated the authorship. After his unexpected death a misapprehension has happened. One photograph came to light. It was published everywhere and its author 'became' Bresson (he's smiling). It's logical, because Sartre had only Bresson's works. And the old Bresson maybe didn't know about the publishing. I appealed to one foreign agency. They agreed that the photograph was good, but didn't agree that it's author could be Antanas Sutkus. In that agency one person told he had seen those 'Bresson's works' in some book… I had to look all my archive far and wide. I printed the negative with Simone de Beauvoir following Sartre and showed that I had the original, so I could simply be considered the author of the picture. Now there is a sculpture in the French national library's yard, and it is alike Sartre in my photo. Maybe I should refer to the copyright agency…(laughing).

    So photography is like natural communicating to you?

    Sartre has been in Lithuania only five days, and I have arranged exhibition of works from that meeting. Photography is a part of communication, relation to the world. The next question is if it makes something good.

    Doesn't photography prompt to look to the world through the objective?

    No person looks to the world through the objective. He lives his life by himself, and objective is not even an eye. He photographs by his consciousness, intuition, intellect. Objective and eye are only auxilliary tools. By the way, nowadays you can photograph exactly with your eyes. Earlier everything was differently.
    Now it's very difficult to photograph. People reaction is bad. Negative. Earlier only contact was enough. Like giving a girl glad eye. You take a look, and if you like her, you photograph. Speaking is after that. And now you have to askfor person's permission, you have to explain, to lay out your ideas, etc.

    It is very interesting to listen to you. Please, tell something more, your reminiscences. Maybe about the two pioneers. You have got two famous photos. One of them is called "A Pioneer". Another is without a name (pioneers - soviet children organization).

    Those terrible photos are from The School of the Blind in Kaunas. I got a gold Archangel Michael prize for the first picture in Italy. It was published in the magazine "Soviet Photo". Then comments overflowed: "photography Solženicyn came into existence.." (the person who squint-eyed against the soviet order). Editor saved my skin. She told that if there had been something bad in that photo, she wouldn't have published it. "Pioneer" wasn't like children vanguard agent ought to be: he wasn't smiling or playing a trumpet, he looked like from a concentration camp,serious, sober. I didn't show the other works from that school. Then they couldn't be shown, they had no right to exist. And I was a pessimist. Nobody thoughtful, even a child, with his psychology inward, in the eyes couldn't please the soviet government. Any person in normal clothes, not certainly wearing a shirt and tie (pioneer uniform) was considered as vilifying the soviet life. My associates were upset because they couldn't publish their works. I was the president of Photo-artists society, I didn't publish works, which didn't satisfy government demands. Our Photo-artists company has been the only one in the USSR for 18 years. We had to be careful: if the president would make 'bad' photos, how the members would work? Our company every few years was tried to liquidate, so we had to confer with Moscow, from there directions were sent. Communicating, unfortunately, proceeded not at the bare table. Alcohol took away not a small part of my life. Only illnesses saved from it, when alcohol was forbidden for a year or more. At first it is like a contact motos, but later takes back a debt, organism begs for it. I suggest to start drinking and smoking as late as it's possible, because in my age you'll want to drink some good vine, but you won't be able to. Young people must be giddy with youth, not alcohol.
    After eight or ten years I published my catalog "Barefoot nostalgia". And what about my colleagues? Maybe they didn't have any forbidden manuscripts and photoworks. I didn't talk much, maybe they thought I had nothing either. (By the way, some partners now are working with their archives, for example, Algimantas Kunčius).

    Was the "Blind Pioneer" shown only in the independent Lithuania?

    Yes. Talking of it, I found it just then. I have a lot of photos, which haven't been published then. Now for the most part I work with the archives. It's an organizational work, there is no time to photograph. Not long ago I arranged big exposition "ES in a positive" - I was showing about hundred works in the European modern art exhibition at Berlin Arts academy. Strange though it may seem, but I was given a lot of space. It's somehow strange that such works are highly commended abroad. In Lithuania many people don't know what it is. They don't understand that the Soviets are reminiscences only. Yes, some kind of memory …

    All photos are some some kind of memory. Have you any pictures from your first experimentation? Would you let us publish student's Antanas Sutkus works in our edition?

    Unhappily I haven't saved my schooltime archive. Leaving for Vilnius I left my archive at home. And when I came back, I didn't find my negatives. My cousin told me he had made squibs of them.(smiling)
    I'm going to look far and wide my youth archive in a few years. I found some interesting photos. Look, in this one we are near my mother's house : the first from the left is my love Ema, next to her is my friend Algis. Now Ema lives in Germany with her family. Once I participated in a conference Volga - Elbe - not because I felt thirsty for lectures… I still loved her, longed for her even when I had a family. The first love is like a splinter - it's difficult to wrest it. At least ten years. My advice: save your first love, do not let her leave, and if you haven't saved it, wrest the sliver as quickly as possible.

    Gintarė Žabaitė and Julija Matulytė,
    Lithuanian Youth Technical Creativity Palace
    Photostudio

Photos, printed in edition



Aurelija PAKELYTĖ (16 y.)



Antanas SUTKUS - On the doorstep of mother's home 1958