Antanas Sutkus Lithuanian Portraits / Signs of Time

White Space Gallery and Gallery.Photographer.ru have published a book of photographs by Antanas Sutkus, which is a catalogue for the exhibition ‘Lithuanian Portraits’, presented by Anya Stonelake/White Space Gallery in London and ‘Signs of Time’ by Gallery.Photographer.ru in Moscow. Antanas Sutkus, a master of monochrome documentary photography, has had a strong influence on the development of photography in the Baltic. His lucid and extraordinary images of everyday events in his Lithuanian homeland have been compared to the humanistic approach of Henri Cartier-Bresson and Andre Kertesz. Sutkus’ body of work bears witness to the country’s subjection to Soviet rule, presenting a visual history of Communism in an objective but humanistic documentary style. Throughout, it is the daily trials of ordinary Lithuanians from rural villages that tell the story. Beyond recording events, Sutkus’ keen eye finds history in human faces. Treading a delicate path that is rooted in care for his subjects, the photographer manages to avoid sentimentality in recording the passage of being into life – and towards death.  Filled with romance, beauty and sadness, they move beyond photographic realism like stills from an unmade film. His stated aim is ‘to make an attempt at drawing a psychological portrait of contemporary man’. He continues – ‘future generations will judge our way of life, our culture and our inner world on the basis of photographs.’ This bilingual publication (Russian and English) contains the introduction by Nadim Julien Samman, an interview with Antanas Sutkus by Victoria Musvik, the essay “The Counter-Images of Antanas Sutkus” by Ben Lewis, and photographs by Antanas Sutkus.