Pianist-painter’s art takes flight
Lithuanian musician Victor Paukstelis will make his Canadian debut at Music Niagara festival
Lithuanian pianist-painter Victor (Viktoras) Paukstelis may not live in a gilded cage, but at least he’s as happy as a lark.
“I think it’s always, for artist, quite difficult to survive,” said Paukstelis by phone from his home in Vilnius, Lithuania, last week. “At the moment, I live not perfectly well, but I am happy with the situation which I have. I have some good friends who buy my paintings, and I say big thank you to them. And I have some concert agencies who invite me to play in Lithuania and also around in Europe.”
Not only that, but Paukstelis, 33, has several CDs under his belt, and he’s returning to New York’s Carnegie Hall this November. This Sunday, Paukstelis will make his Canadian debut at Atis Bankas’s Music Niagara festival in St. Mark’s Church in Niagara-on-the-Lake. Paukstelis’s mini-recital will be a multimedia affair similar to his March 2015 “A Recital of Restless Paintings” in the Chamber Music Hall of Berlin’s Philharmonie where animated images of his artworks were projected onto a screen as he played.
In St. Mark’s, Paukstelis will be performing seven pieces by Jean-Philippe Rameau including “The Hen” and “The Savages,” as well as a rare bird in these parts, Alexander Scriabin’s “Fifth Sonata,” a high watermark in the Russian composer’s output for piano before his music became increasingly calculated and steely.
Paukstelis, whose name means “birdie” in Lithuanian, comes from a musical family. His grandmother and mother are pianists, his father (also Viktoras) and his brother are composers who also work at the Ciurlionis Foundation, named after the Lithuanian composer-painter whose short life straddled the turn of the 20th century. Paukstelis began his musical studies at age five, and painting lessons at age 10. He attended musical institutions in Vilnius as well as in Germany and France, but also studied at the National M. K. Ciurlionis School of Art for two years, and later took lessons from the Lithuanian-Israeli painter Leo Ray.
Ray’s influence can be detected in 12 of Paukstelis’s paintings, which are currently on exhibit in the Niagara Pumphouse. Paukstelis boils down his visual art to two styles.
“One style is made by acrylic colours on canvas,” said Paukstelis. “It’s more wild. It’s more fantasy painting, more surrealistic. There you have very strong colours, very strong contrasts in colour.”
As for his other style, he says it’s “more lyric, more monochromatic.” For inspiration, he uses old photographs, some even of his family.
And yes, Paukstelis also paints birds, but with a twist.
“I draw birds,” conceded Paukstelis though with a caveat. “It’s more my soul I am expressing. My soul, not just birds.”
The concert’s second half will feature violinist Tim Chooi, one of a batch of winners in the 2015 Canada Council Musical Instrument Bank competition, performing on the 1717 Windsor-Weinstein Stradivari (valued at $5.5 million), as well as Ric Heinl, from Toronto’s Geo. Heinl & Co., who’ll demonstrate on some rare string instruments.
This summer the Brott Music Festival is packaging its chamber music offerings under what must surely be the world’s best title: “The World’s Best Chamber Music Series.” (Sure, it’s over the top, but at least it trumps, “Make Chamber Music Great Again.”) The three-part series at The Church of St. John the Evangelist, 320 Charlton Ave. W., kicks off on Wednesday, July 20 at 7:30 p.m. with members of the NAO performing works by Schubert, Mozart, and Harry Freedman.
On Thursday, July 21 at 2 p.m., there’ll be works by Beethoven, Dvorak, and Kulesha. At 7:30 p.m., it’s Tchaikovsky’s “Serenade for Strings,” Hétu’s “Wind Quintet” op. 13, excerpts from Handel’s “Water Music,” and more.
Former Spec music critic Hugh Fraser will chat about the works 45 minutes prior to each concert. Tickets are $30, senior $27, Brott35 $25, student $15.