Vitautas Iurkunas

(also Vytautas Jurkünas). Born May 19 (June 1), 1910, in the village of Vindeikiuose, in what is now Sirvintus Raion. Soviet graphic artist. People’s Artist of the USSR (1963). Member of the CPSU since 1949.

Iurkunas studied at the Kaunas Art School from 1929 to 1935 under A. Galdikas and M. V. Dobuzhinskii. In 1945 he began teaching in Vilnius at the Art Institute of the Lithuanian SSR, where he became a professor in 1960. Iurkunas’ graphics deal with topical political and social problems and are noted for their poetic quality and delicacy of form; they include the cycle Atrocities of the Fascist Occupiers (linocuts, 1945–46) and I Will Be a Milkmaid! (linocut, 1960). Iurkunas has illustrated many literary works, including D. Poška’s The Peasant of Žemaitija and Lithuania (1947, 1959–62).

Iurkunas has been awarded the Order of Lenin and three other orders.