Poetry in the Yards of Šilainiai

The actors Edita Niciūtė and Arnis Aleinikovas, initiators for one of the five interdisciplinary Kaunas Biennial projects in Kaunas communities this summer, invited the people of Šilainiai area to share their own poetry.

The project “Eiliuoti Šilainių kiemai” (“The queues of the Yards of Šilainiai”) attracted authors who simply “snatched” pages from their personal diaries and dared to give them to a recording studio. Others shared that only text they wrote in a lifetime, and one local creator sent even two books of her own.

The texts were read by the authors together with the professional actors. You can hear nostalgic texts drawing on the landscapes of the hometowns and nature; the queues are dedicated to the passed family members, and of course lots of the poems about love. All the poets involved in the project are quite different, for example, the poet Irena was writing poems all her life, which are intended only for pilots – she has compiled the entire Lithuanian aviation chronicle. Julia’s poem “Skype” talks about the realities of today’s emigrants’ lives, about the fact that grandparents and grandchildren no longer speak the same language when communicating via Skype.

The live event was held on the 31st of July in Šilainiai district, where actors and authors shared the poetry with the community. The poems will be available on different audio platforms.

Authors: Julija Augustauskienė, Dalia Sakalauskienė, Aldona Mankutė- Kursevičienė, Dalia Buragienė, Zenė Sadauskaitė, Vilija Grigaliūnaitė, Herminija Vokietaitienė, Vida Gustaitytė-Bubnienė, Agnius Rušys, Gintaras Povilavičius and Raimundas Eimontas.

Photos by Nanook | Severina Venckutė and Martyna Šulskutė.

The project is a part of the MagiC Carpets, supported by Creative Europe 2014–2020, a EU programme, and Lithuanian Council for Culture.