On January 22, 2022, the programming of Kaunas – European Capital of Culture officially began. In addition to Lithuania’s second-largest city, this year Esch-sur-Alzette (Luxembourg) and Novi Sad (Serbia) also earned this designation. As always, the programme is ambitious and packed with impactful names, with an unbelievable number of cultural events almost daily. Faced with such a task, the team has been working together for several years; first in the application, then in the preparation of the event(s) and finally in its implementation. However, the big question for any city with this mission is what will happen in the month following the swarm of happenings. Without an answer for now (of course), this is a concern addressed with honesty by director Virginija Vitkienė. For the CEO of Kaunas – European Capital of Culture, the project could be a turning point in how the country deals with the past.

With a recent history of re-independence from the USSR, Lithuania has been one of the eastern countries with the greatest development in the last two decades. And it is now trying to underline this with a dynamic and diverse cultural landscape. Kaunas, which temporarily became the country’s capital in 1919, has reasserted itself as a multicultural city with a multi-religious heritage, although it has not been able to deal with historical memory. Virginija Vitkienė admits that “the city urgently needed this title”, as Kaunas seeks to build an identity after years of conflict, repression and Soviet rule. The CEO of the project goes further, stating that Kaunas – European Capital of Culture 2022 is a key step in the process of “denuding and healing the trauma”. To this end, the organisation has chosen collective memory as one of the main features of this year’s events. The aim is to gather the necessary conditions to start the conversation about the past, including the country’s positioning during the holocaust. For many years, Kaunas was an extremely important fortress city due to its geopolitical positioning, a metaphor for the population’s behaviour. According to Virginija Vitkienė, the inhabitants have always been used to protecting themselves. In 2022, the aim is the opposite: to make the city and its people welcome and embrace Europe and Europeans.

In opposition to the enthusiasm and the human mass raised by the European Capitals of Culture, there is huge scepticism about the sustainability of the infrastructures, organisations and events created with the one-off financial resources. Asked about this, Virginija Vitkienė hopes that most of the new projects will continue and asserts that this was one of the structure’s concerns throughout the process. Still, she stresses that increasing funding for the cultural sector also depends on politics. However, Kaunas 2022 has made a great effort to ensure the self-sufficiency of the thousands of projects. As the CEO explains, the overall budget has been distributed in two equal tranches: the first to spend during the five years of preparation and the second during the year of implementation.

In relation to the visual arts, the emphasis on large-scale projects by William Kentridge, Marina Abramović and Yoko Ono should be noted. The first presents the exhibition That Which We Do Not Remember, a special moment for the artist, in his first major presentation in Eastern Europe, precisely in the country of his ancestors. The exhibition is not only a sentimental reunion between Kentridge and Kaunas, but also a critique; or at least a reminder of the collective erasure of historical facts as a method of survival or, at worst, political propaganda. It also has to be said that some of the works for this occasion will be permanently installed in the city. Marina Abramović will open in March Memory of Being, a major exhibition that will revisit her artistic production, in particular the documentation of iconic performances in the 1960s and videos, going up to the present day. In Yoko Ono’s case, the ambitious production will be divided into two moments. One can already be visited: it is the monumental installation Ex It. The other will open in September in a co-production with the Serralves Foundation. It will be a major retrospective of the artist, which simultaneously commemorates the life of a local artist, Jurgis Mačiūnas, the pioneer of the fluxus movement.

In addition to these events, there will be over 1000 projects, covering many cultural facets. It is possible to consult all this on the Kaunas 2022 website. The official representation of the European Capital of Culture began in January and ends on December 31 this year.