The Triangle of Interwar Art Schools, Riga, Vilnius, and Kaunas: Who was Studying There and From Where Did They Come?

During the interwar period, newly (re)established art schools in Riga (Latvijas Mākslas akadēmija 1918), Vilnius (Wydziału Sztuk Pięknych Uniwersytetu Stefana Batorego w Wilnie 1919) and Kaunas (Kauno meno mokykla 1922), made a strong statement to accept both genders to pursuit art education. In compasion, it was not a case in most of the European art academies, such as Vienna (Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien) or Munchen (Akademie der Bildenden Künste München), which opened their doors for females only from 1920.

The newly opened art schools in the Eastern European region become an attractive alternative for both: male and female youth. The uniqueness of this research lies in the fact, that historiography mostly points towards male artists and their successful efforts to enter the art world. On the other hand, all the unsuccessful stories of male and female art students stay in the shadow. The records of the art school students‘ give us a significant possibility to track, compare and analyze the quantity of youth (both genders and different religions) who had a dream to pursue an artistic career.

The personal files of the students reveal the first efforts to enter the professional art field via education and propose the information, such as birth date, place, family background, secondary education, artistic preparation, or financial issues. Although, the particular attention highlights female students, who firstly, had to surpass negative conservative society opinion about female artists. In this context, the Jewish female art students play a significant role who firstly had to surpass gender obstacles as female artists and secondly, religious aspect, such as prohibition to depict. Due to the following reasons, art education become an unofficial invitation to rebel against traditional society and gender issues. Which overall, is defined by questions who decided to go against the conservative ideas and from where they were coming to study art in Riga, Vilnius, and Kaunas?