Iuozas Iokubo Mikenas

(in Latvian, Juozas Mikėnas). Born Jan. 30 (Feb. 12), 1901, on the farmstead of Skardupis, in present-day Daugavpils Raion, Latvian SSR; died Oct. 24, 1964, in Vilnius. Soviet sculptor, founder of Soviet Lithuanian sculpture. People’s Artist of the USSR (1961); corresponding member of the Academy of Arts of the USSR (1954). Became a member of the CPSU in 1952.

Mikenas studied at the Kaunas Art School under J. Vienožinskis and K. Šklėrius from 1922 to 1926 and in Paris at the Ecole Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs and in the studios of C. Despiau and M. Gimond from 1927 to 1931. He taught in Kaunas at the Art School (1931–40) and the Institute of Applied and Decorative Art (1946–51) and in Vilnius at the Art Institute of the Lithuanian SSR (1940–41 and from 1951) and the Academy of Arts (1941–46; professor from 1946). Mikenas’ pupils included G. Jokūbonis, J. Kėdainis, and K. Kisielis.

Mikenas’ works are marked by romantic generalization and, at the same time, a subtle spirituality. The inner vitality of forms is combined with a picturesque, detailed modeling of the surface. The artist’s works include a male portrait (plaster of paris, 1945), the bas-relief Mother (marble, 1935, M. K. Čiurlionis Museum of Art, vKaunas), The Wood-carver (plaster of paris, 1937–38, M. K. Čiurlionis Museum of Art), the statue Lithuania for the Lithuanian Pavilion at the World’s Fair in New York in 1939 (plaster of paris, 1939), the group Victory in Kaliningrad (part of the monument to the 1,200 guardsmen who fell in the attack of Königsberg, bronze, 1946; State Prize of the USSR, 1947), and the monument to M. Melnikaite in the city of Zarasai (bronze, 1947–55). Other works are The Young Pianist (bronze, 1958, Tret’iakov Gallery), Peace (plaster of paris, 1960, property of the Ministry of Culture of the USSR), and The First Swallows (plaster of paris, 1964, Art Museum of the Lithuanian SSR, Vilnius). Mikenas received the State Prize of the Lithuanian SSR in 1966.