Meninė intelektualinė kūryba egzilyje

Abstract

Artistic intellectual creativity is an especially good indicator of the peculiarity of émigré intellectual history. The liberal and Catholic segments of the Lithuanian exile community had different conceptions of creativity, though both agreed that it was the best method for achieving Lithuania's liberation. The liberals (Vytautas Kavolis et al.) formulated a more universal conception of intellectual creativity as something for its own sake and not just limited to the exportation of creative potentiality to the Lithuanian homeland. In the diaspora this potentiality had to become open to the cultural traditions of the Western world and to absorb influences from the current environment. The liberals thought that Lithuanian creativity should not confine itself to the framework of the exile cultural ghetto, whereas representatives of the Catholic wing (Juozas Girnius, Juozas Eretas) emphatically associated creativity with the conception of a cultural ghetto. In relation to the concept of intellectual creativity, the artist or scholar in exile was pressured to accept a community responsibility. The Catholic wing of the diaspora wanted to foster a creative personality that ignored its own individuality and limited itself to the concerns of the community, while the liberals encouraged a process of "creative rejuvenation" and thought to offer the creator an opportunity to become a cosmopolitan intellectual who openly reflected his ties to both his community and he cultural traditions of the world. Despite their different views on the development of artistic intellectual culture, both the liberal and the Catholic wingof the diaspora conceived of the creative act as an organically important action of the subconscious, one able to assuage the pain of a historical injustice.