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Tue, 10 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The Kaunas Plainchant Book from the Seventeenth Century: One More Riddle

Jonas Vilimas — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The aim of this article is to present the Kaunas plainchant manuscript from the seventeenth century, which was not known to scholars to date. It is preserved at the House of Mikas and Kipras Petrauskas of the Kaunas City Museum. The paper deals with both external and internal features of the manuscript by considering the characteristics of the binding of the book, the paper used in it, and the notation and the chants recorded in it. Special attention is given to the liturgical attributes and the system according to which the chants are distributed in the book. On the one hand, it demonstrates that the manuscript is a multifunctional chant book consisting of both proper and ordinary chants for the Mass (the first part) as well as the proper chants for the divine office (the second and bigger part of the manuscript). On the basis of the external features (binding, paper) and internal features, some presumptions are made regarding the provenance of this plainchant book. One of the possibilities is that this manuscript was made and used in the milieu of the Franciscan Observants, who had a number of monasteries all over the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, including one in Kaunas.

Another Look at the Activities of the Chapel of the Order of Barefoot Trinitarians of Antakalnis in Vilnius

Alicja Dacevič — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The article presents new information on several aspects of the activities of the chapel of the Roman Catholic monastery of Barefoot Trinitarian at the Church of the Savior in Antakalnis (Vilnius), which was discovered in manuscript and published sources in Vilnius and Cracow. The studies by the musicologists Vytautas Povilas Jurkštas and Laima Budzinauskienė are extended by clarifying, supplementing, and expanding the known facts.
The newly discovered facts confirm that this chapel started functioning before 1760 and stopped its musical activity after the monastery was closed in 1864. This significantly expands the data available so far. The donor of the chapel, Maksimilian Rozenfeldt (Maksimilijonas Rosenfeldtas), was possibly also the founder of the chapel of the Vilnius Roman Catholic monastery of Barefoot Trinitarians at the Church of the Savior in Antakalnis. His financial contribution to the chapel was significant, and his role as a special patron was obvious until the closure of the monastery.
Between 1786 and 1851, the number of members of the chapel fluctuated between five and sixteen people. A third of the names of the members of the group between 1776 and 1862 (throughout its existence, the chapel had 100 members in total) are published for the first time. The lists of instruments compiled during the visitations of 1830 and 1851 would suggest that the instruments owned by the chapel were suitable for performing Baroque and Classical music.

Some Examples of Marginalia in the Margins of Musical Manuscripts: From Quill Attempts to a Portrait Graffiti

Laima Budzinauskienė — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0200

In her research, the author of this article has studied Lithuanian musical manuscripts from various perspectives, and in this work she draws attention to another aspect of these sources – the marginalia. The information inscribed in various forms in the margins of musical manuscripts (literally and figuratively) is undoubtedly an important yet rarely researched expression of cultural communication, which is related to newly discovered facts pertaining to the document’s history and reveals new values. This article examines several musical manuscripts preserved in sheet music collection No. 105 in the Rare Books and Manuscripts Department of the Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania. They are enriched with various kinds of marginalia, such as quill attempts, signature attempts, an autograph, a text, a drawing, and a portrait graffiti. The study employed theoretical-descriptive, empirical, iconographic and iconological research methods allowing for a comprehensive investigation, evaluation, and disclosure of the meanings and significance of the content of the manuscript marginalia both for the community at the time and for current research.

The Posthuman Landscape in Lithuanian Photography

Margarita Matulytė — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The object of the research presented in this article is the posthuman landscapes that artists create by de-objectifying reality through photography, thus transforming its matter into imaginary landscapes of the future. In the medium of hybrid reality and in the face of the ecological crisis, the artists ontologically neutralise the dominance of homo sapiens in relation to the Earth and Nature and contemplate (imagine) scenarios of the post-Anthropocene development.
The futurological work of the visionaries involved in the Posthuman Turn discourse reveals artistic visions of the future of civilisation. By drawing utopian or dystopian perspectives, Vitalijus Butyrinas, Elena Grudzinskaitė, and Dovilė Dagienė shape the new landscapes intuitively or conceptually: they incorporate the consequences of the Anthropocene and the end of humanity into their fictional narratives, they destroy or deform the appearance of the landscape, creating structures of an unknown world. Based on Francesca Ferrando’s theory of posthumanism, the ideological models of the works reveal the direction of the post-anthropocentric landscape: from humanistic nostalgia and the aspiration for a perfect world to the critical attainment of the end of the history of civilisation and the total disappearance of the human.
Predicting the future of humanity is one of the most challenging tasks scientists are trying to solve with the help of artificial intelligence. In an attempt to hypothetically test visionary creative work through AI research, it must be acknowledged that AI has not yet reached a technological level where it can objectively project the outlook for the Earth and the human life. Furthermore, the post-humanist future is impossible to predict in humanitarian terms, but it is worth listening with intent to the paradoxical imagery expressed through the means of art, because this message encourages us to improve the present and change the way we think.

The Melancholic Image of the Northerner in Hans Abrahamsen’s Works

Faustina Dedūraitė — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0200

In the present cultural context, the concept of melancholy is seldom employed and, given its dual or even contradictory meanings, is challenging to discern. The phenomenon of melancholy is often described as a mood, an emotion, or a disease and is characterised by different levels, including emotional, creative, resistance, existential, and pathological. It also reveals philosophical and artistic interpretations that frequently juxtapose melancholy with the aesthetic categories of nostalgia and silence. The broad expression of the characteristics of melancholy is specific not only to individuals but also to certain groups, historical periods, and other aesthetic categories. In this case, melancholy is associated with the concept of Nordic music and has been used to characterise the creative output of the Danish composer Hans Abrahamsen. It proposes that, due to the identified specific connotations of Nordic nature and their links to the phenomenon of melancholy, this can be seen as an indication of Abrahamsen’s distinctive creative prototype. The work simultaneously opens up the ambiguity of the phenomenon of melancholy and the concept of Nordic music, thus encouraging a wide interpretative field.

The Creative Field of Censorship: Several Research Perspectives

Goda Dapšytė-Šlektavičienė — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The article analyses the concept of censorship and presents two main approaches to its study. It discusses the traditional perspective, which is based on the clear opposition between the censor and the censored, and the approaches of new censorship, which emphasise the analysis of censorship as a complex phenomenon. In the traditional approach, censorship is treated as an institutionally established repressive form of control, whose activities are defined by chronological and territorial boundaries. This concept highlights the system of prohibitions and restrictions imposed by governing institutions, whose primary goal is to prevent the dissemination of undesirable knowledge, ideas, or works. However, this perspective often overlooks the long-term impact of censorship on the sociocultural context.
In contrast, researchers in new censorship analyse censorship not only as repressive but also as a constitutive force that not only prohibits but also creates new discourses. Such censorship operates subtly, dispersing and relocating elements of discourse, aiming not only at control but also at shaping social and cultural norms. This perspective allows censorship to be viewed as a constantly functioning and ever-present force whose effects extend beyond institutional boundaries, encompassing the participation of society and individual groups in the censorship process.
The article proposes combining traditional and new censorship perspectives to provide a comprehensive assessment of the phenomenon. The structural clarity of the traditional approach, focusing on institutional analysis, balances the emphasis of new censorship researchers on the functioning of power mechanisms within social and cultural contexts. The integration of these two approaches enables an understanding of both the historical and contemporary aspects of censorship. Such a synthesis of methods not only broadens the scope for censorship studies but also helps uncover its impact on the development of theatre.