Šiauliai “Aušros” Museum has an honourable mission – in cooperation with the Royal Łazienki Museum, to present creative work of the outstanding 19th century traveller and photographer Benedykt Henryk Tyszkiewicz (1852-1935) to the Polish audience in Warsaw.
The author’s works shown in the exhibition have become one of the most prominent recent discoveries in the history of early creative photography of Lithuania. The photographer’s legacy, previously considered missing and brought back to Lithuania by collector Gediminas Petraitis (deceased), has significantly enriched the history of photography in Lithuania and revealed new links between Lithuanian and Polish history and culture. It is no coincidence that this first trip of the newly discovered collection from Lithuania to exhibition halls abroad was organised here, and the exhibition was held under the auspices of the highest leaders of the countries: the President of the Republic of Poland Andrzej Duda and the President of the Republic of Lithuania Gitanas Nausėda.
Based on the materials of various Lithuanian museums and private collections, the curators of the exhibition, Dr Dainius Junevičius and Dr Małgorzata Maria Grąbczewska, have prepared an exhaustive and versatile presentation of the works of B. H. Tyszkiewicz, which allows to comprehensively get to know the author himself and the world he attempted to embrace in his life and in his photography.