VU and Tadas Kazakevičius Present an Art Project Showing the Relationship between Student and Teacher

A warm and open relationship between teacher and pupil, lecturer and student, is a great aspiration – it is one that encourages learning, growth and the courage to ask questions. In order to emphasise the importance of creating such a relationship and having the courage to ask questions, Vilnius University (VU) is presenting the artistic project “Discover the World through Questions”, in collaboration with the portraitist and one of the most famous contemporary Lithuanian representatives of documentary photography, Tadas Kazakevičius.

T. Kazakevičius, who has a degree in architecture, started taking photographs more than a decade ago. Today, he is an acclaimed documentary photographer, both in Lithuania and worldwide. The cycle of photographs by T. Kazakevičius titled “That Which Will No Longer Be” (“Tai, ko nebebus”) is particularly renowned. In 2017, he was among the finalists at the Lens Culture Exposure Awards, and in 2019 – among the finalists of the Leica Oskar Barnack Awards, while some of his works were selected for the Sony World Photography Awards and exhibited at the prestigious Royal Photographic Society exhibition and the Jimei x Arles Chinese Photography Festival. The photographer won the Golden Shot Award at Lithuanian Press Photography Competition.

The “Between Two Shores” series of photographs by T. Kazakevičius, capturing images of the Curonian Spit, also received great acclaim. In 2020, the series won third place in the category of the portrait series of the World Press Photo competition. His work has been published in media outlets such as Time, The New Yorker, The Sunday Times, Monocle and Le Monde.

This year, his portfolio will be supplemented with VU’s proposal to implement a project that portrays VU teachers and students in their working environment.

“I can never take pictures of people if they are fake models who are telling a pseudo-story – that’s difficult for me to do. However, during this photoshoot, I met real teachers and real students, and I was part of their sincere communication in their natural spaces,” said the photographer.

T. Kazakevičius spent a month taking photographs of 15 VU teachers, along with former or current students from various faculties. Success in documentary photography is impossible without the ability to speak to strangers, but according to the photographer, in this photoshoot, he needed to succeed not only in speaking but in encouraging the teacher and student to communicate with each other.

“It was interesting to understand that in creating this series of photographs, it is not so easy to photograph several people interacting with each other without hiding their faces, looking for moments when they appear both in contact and with their faces facing me in front of my lens. It was a kind of challenge.

On the other hand, it was very easy for me because they could communicate. If at the beginning I needed to talk to them, let them understand our common goal, then, in the long run, they communicated on everyday issues and topics common to them,” T. Kazakevičius explained about the behind-the-scenes operation of the photoshoot.

The plans for the photoshoot were also altered by the outbreak of war in Ukraine on 24 February: “I found it very difficult that when we started this photoshoot, the war in Ukraine broke out – and we never avoided this topic. Therefore, the goal to have a light and natural mood was not easy to achieve, it was difficult to avoid this topic in our conversations as well,” said the photographer.

T. Kazakevičius, together with the journalist Lisa Abend, told the US news magazine Time about the initiatives taken by Lithuanians at the outbreak of war. One of the most recent stories was about Lithuanian volunteers who decided to join the fight for freedom in Ukraine. When asked whether everything takes on a different meaning in this context, T. Kazakevičius replied that everyone has been united by a common goal.

“It all comes down to having a common goal and the passion of two people – either the photographer and the model, or the teacher and the student – to achieve something. In this case, it’s either the photographer who creates a certain atmosphere in which the protagonist can tell a true story, or the teacher who creates a certain space for the student not to be afraid to ask even the most basic questions and not to feel wrong by doing so. It seems to me that a common goal often brings people together because they have a common denominator, a common passion, and a common moment in which they have come together.

This is not possible if one of the parties has no interest in achieving that goal. I think it is impossible for a teacher to help a student if the student has no interest. In the same way, I couldn’t tell a true story with a protagonist who didn’t own that story," said the documentary photographer.

This artistic project is a follow-up to last year’s project with the legendary photographer and laureate of the Lithuanian National Prize for Culture and Arts, Antanas Sutkus, and his student, Artūras Morozovas. This year, the series of portraits featuring VU teachers and students will reveal the genuine, sincere teacher-student relationship and the importance of the courage to ask questions.