EXHIBITION "CZESŁAW MIŁOSZ: THE SEARCH FOR A HOMELAND" 27 June – 5 December, 2011 Cover of the exhibition's invitation Exhibition "Czesław Miłosz: The Search for a Homeland" tends to present one of the greatest writers of the 20th century, Polish poet and a Nobel prize winner born in Lithuania, Czesław Miłosz. Nobody has described the condition of a captive mind more precisely then him. In his works he preserved many facets of his primary experiences, combining them with classical moral values and measurements of individual responsibility. Miłosz’s externally simple yet simultaneously philosophical presence was influenced by the fact that he lived to a ripe age, exceeding ninety years on this earth, that he lived in different countries under different political conditions, and that he saw and experienced a great deal, including misfortune and pain in is personal life. Without being disillusioned, he understood that “all the concepts men live by are the product of the historical formation in which they find themselves”. Yet in this unavoidable position he managed to preserve a free and unsubdued consciousness. He experienced the greatest catastrophes of the 20th century, man’s “displacement”, and the illusionary returns and absences. He remained creative and preserved the belief that no circumstances, even the most extreme, can exhaust man’s potential to choose. In 20th century European poetry, Miłosz brought most sense to the ever-increasingly relevant concept of the geography of man, ecompassing that special mental space where the rivers of one’s homeland never cease to flow, where ancient trees never cease to whisper, or real and mystical river valleys faintly shimmer forever, “where the sun rises and where it sets”. Viktorija Daujotytė, Mindaugas Kvietkauskas   Photographs and documents displayed in the exhibition taken from: Kėdainiai Regional Museum Kaišiadoriai Museum Vytautas the Great War Museum Lithuanian Central State Archive Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences Lithuanian National Martynas Mažvydas Library Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript library, Yale University. Exhibition authors: dr. Margarita Matulytė, Romualdas Budrys Exhibition curators: dr. Margarita Matulytė, dr. Gediminas Mikelaitis, Mindaugas Šapoka Exhibition coordinator Barbara Orszewska Text translators: Almis Grybauskas, Robert Hass, Louis Iribarne, Algis Kalėda, Juozas Kėkštas, Catherine S. Leach, Beata Piasecka, Diana Senechal, Albina Strunga, Juozas Tumelis, Tomas Venclova Photographers: Algimantas Aleksandravičius, Vaidotas Aukštaitis, Maciej Billewicz, Jan Bułhak, Balys Buračas, Adomas Daukša, Algimantas Kezys, Jokūbas Skrinskas, Bolesława Zdanowska, Edmund Zdanowski The exhibition organizers would like to thank Anthony Oscar Miłosz for permission to use Czesław Miłosz’s texts; Prof. Viktorija Daujotytė and Dr. Mindaugas Kvietkauskas for permission to use their book about Czesław Miłosz