The Culture Ministry on Monday named Labašauskas’ project for a memorial to freedom fighters resembling a forest and guerrilla bunkers as the winner of the competition.
Sculptor and designer Labašauskas suggested forming a small mound merging into Lukiškių Square as a continuation of its lawns and paths, emphasizing his vision of the square as a free and open space of the city.
“That tradition of sculpture is actually dead, not used for a long time. The world has advanced. It’s 2017 now,” he told reporters at the capital’s Contemporary Art Center.
Labašauskas said that he entered the contest to offer an alternative to sculptor Artūras Sakalauskas‘ proposed statue of the Lithuanian national symbol Vytis, a knight on horseback, adding that the competitor’s project had political support.
The memorial is to be built in the reconstructed Lukiškių Square by Dec. 1, 2018, with the Culture Ministry expected to allocate up to 500,000 euros for this purpose.
Discussions on the fate of Lukiškių Square have been ongoing since Lithuania regained independence from the Soviet Union in 1990 and removed the capital’s statue of Lenin from its central square.
The organized armed resistance against the Soviet occupation began in 1944 and ended in 1953.