Mindaugas Kavaliauskas was born in 1974 in Kaunas, where he lives and works until now. He is photographer, historian, critic, publicist, curator, lecturer, publisher of photography, member of the Union of Lithuanian Art Photographers (since 1993) and founder and director of NGO „Šviesos raštas“ (2003-present). He has held over thirty personal exhibitions of his works in Lithuania, European countries, USA, Australia and has participated in more than ten group exhibitions in Lithuania, Netherlands, Greece, France, Germany, Poland, Russia, Slovakia, Italy, China.

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Everyone of us has different visions about his or her country. Sometimes the visions are based on experience of reality, memories, and sometimes they are based on bits and pieces of media supplied imagery, gossip or stereotypes. In previous century, looking from narrow streets of European old towns or from skyscrapers of America, Lithuania seemed to be like a distant province lost in the middle of nowhere of time and space with its lifestyle remote from that of the global metropolis. This kind of attitude was also current within Lithuania, when someone from the city would speak of a place reachable by gravel road, describing it as hopeless countryside.

On the threshold of the 21 st century, living outside Lithuania in self–confident Paris, in Chicago of contrasts, in Geneva, indifferent about its own luxury, I was developing a photographer’s appetite to learn, see and show what Lithuania of the new millennium was looking like. Unexpected collapse of the World Trade Center towers in New York, differently from the fall of Berlin wall, was far from being a joyful event. And yet, it was revelative about the growing tensions and vanishing gap between the centers and the province. This event has proved that globalization forces us to share same joys, disappointments and fears regardless of where we live.