COLLECTORS: OPEN CARDS

At the Galaunė House-Museum (Vydūno Ave. 2, Kaunas)  the playing card exhibition “Collectors: Open Cards” is on display.

The exhibition presents a collection of playing cards by collector Giedrius Steponavičius, gathered from various countries around the world, with special attention given to Lithuanian cards. He began collecting cards twelve years ago, starting with the first deck that caught his interest at a flea market, and today his collection has grown to more than 3,000 decks.

The exhibits on display reveal the thematic and visual diversity of this collection, highlighting different aspects of the history and culture of playing cards in Lithuania and beyond. Here, cards are viewed not only as a means of play, but also as an independent phenomenon of visual culture – their design, symbolism, and artistic expression reflect the aesthetics, political ideas, and cultural contexts of different periods.

The exhibition also features artworks from the collections of the M. K. Čiurlionis National Museum of Art that explore the theme and use of playing cards. Paintings by foreign artists, photographs, and other works illustrate the role of cards in everyday life and culture. Among them are photographs of First Lady Sofija Smetonienė, reflecting her fondness for card games, as well as scenes of the Galaunė family at play, capturing the leisure habits, gatherings, and social rituals of the time.

Historically, playing cards bear witness to technological progress, developments in printing, and the movement of ideas across countries and cultures, while socially they function as tools of communication, ritual, and leisure. They have also long inspired artists – their imagery appears in painting, graphic art, illustration, and posters. Their motifs provide a way to explore themes of chance, fate, luck, and risk – ideas that have always been close to human experience and imagination.

The exhibition series “Collectors”, initiated at the Galaunė House and inspired by Paulius Galaunė, reveals the activities of this renowned bibliophile and collector of graphic works – bookplates, prints, and drawings. He inherited this passion from his father and amassed a collection of more than 800 bookplates dating from the 17th to the 20th centuries, over 12,000 books in his personal library, and more than 1,200 graphic works, which are now preserved at the Galaunė House Museum.

Exhibition curators: Beta Šneliūtė, Raimonda Kvietkutė, Giedrius Steponavičius

Exhibition architect and designer: Jonas Vaikšnoras

The event is open to the public and may be filmed and photographed. By attending, you agree to be featured in photographs and videos of the event and are informed that these materials may be made public.