Fot. Virgilijus Šonta. From the cycle “Mokykla – mano namai” (1980–1983)

April 10, 2025, 5.30 p.m. the exhibition “Mokykla – mano namai” (The School Is My Home) by Virgilijus Šonta (1952–1992) will be opened at the Photography Museum.
The exhibition will be open until May 11, 2025.

Virgilijus Šonta is a well-known Lithuanian photographer active during the 1970s and 1980s. His work notably differed from the Lithuanian School of Photography by not practising self-censorship and actively experimenting with new ideas and topics. His most-known photographic series, “Mokykla – mano namai” (The School Is My Home), created in Šiauliai and Kaunas between 1980 and 1983, documents children’s daily lives in an orphanage for individuals with special needs. During the Soviet era, such individuals were systematically isolated and concealed from public view, thus making Šonta’s chosen subject matter provocative and politically problematic.

In this series, Šonta depicted what it’s like for children living in isolation from the rest of the world. Even so, they experience a wide range of emotions, from happiness during childhood, playing sports and enjoying the sun and snow, to feeling confused and arguing with each other. Most people experience these things, but in this series, they happen to children who are excluded from society and cannot see the world. It covers all kinds of feelings, from love to hate and friendship to conflict.

In 1983, Šiauliai, Lithuania, hosted the pan-Baltic photography festival Amber Land, where Šonta was initially awarded the Grand Prix for “Mokykla – mano namai.” However, upon learning of this decision, officials from Moscow intervened, forbidding the awarding of the Grand Prix to Šonta because his photographs depicted “debiliukai” (an insulting Soviet-era term for individuals with intellectual disabilities). Consequently, the festival’s organisers took away Šonta’s prize, and ultimately, the Grand Prix was cancelled that year.

The current exhibition presents Šonta’s photographs in their original, untouched state. This curatorial decision was made consciously to respect the authenticity of Šonta’s work. Although Romualdas Požerskis, who previously rephotographed or scanned these images, noted that Šonta typically retouched his photographs to achieve technical excellence, the exhibition curators chose not to alter these originals. This choice highlights resistance to contemporary tendencies toward digitally or artificially retouched images. Instead, the curatorial decision seeks to offer an authentic visual historical record unaltered by modern technological interventions. Many photographs exhibited here have never been publicly displayed, giving the viewer an insight into the original visual and material conditions of Šonta’s influential work.

The exhibition has been designed to be dynamic and energetic, reflecting the pace of children’s lives and their rapid learning of the world around them. However, the central section of the exhibition is stationary, symbolising the alienation of these children from society.

The works exhibited in the exhibition are the property of V. Šonta’s family, the exhibition prints were printed from the digital archive of Romualdas Požerskis.

Exhibition curator – Valentyn Odnoviun

Exhibition communication designer – Darius Linkevičius

Organiser – Šiaulių „Aušros“ muziejaus padalinys – Fotografijos muziejus

Sponsor – the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania