Forum.RttP{[travel] Devil Museum (Kaunas, Lithuania)}

The Devil Museum
by Rachel Bignell, Fortean Times

Rachel Bignell detects the whiff of brimstone as she enters the realm of the Horned One in Eastern Europe.

Hidden away in the obscure Lithuanian town of Kaunas, the MK Ciurlionis Velniu Muziejus or Devil Museum is a well-kept secret. I visited mid-week, when the museum was virtually deserted, which only added to its inherent creepiness. There's something unnerving about being alone with 2000 devils...

Velniu Muziejus contains three floors, and a stunning array of devils in all shapes, sizes, colours and materials and hailing from all corners of the globe, is spread over them. The museum has a long-standing tradition: any visitors from foreign lands can bring their own native devil art to add to the collection, making for some interesting viewing.

I began my visit on the third floor, which showcases devil figurines from former Soviet territories. Virtually every state and subculture from Armenia to Yakutia is represented. Those originating in Slavic countries (such as Poland, Ukraine or Russia) appear to share a common theme, namely that of the devil's very closeness to us as he plays out a never-ending battle of one-upmanship with mankind. Some statues show the devil carrying off an unfortunate fellow on his back, others a group of villagers getting their revenge.

The devil has an important place in Slavic folklore: Russian peasants were permanently on guard against him. The most feared place in a traditional peasant village was the banya, or bath house, this being the only place where people removed their prayer belts, thus laying themselves open to attack. Stories abound of devils boiling and flaying unwary late night bathers.

The showcased devils are almost exclusively male, and appear in a variety of styles and aspects. Although most are purely works of art, others have been grafted onto everyday household objects: pipes, ashtrays, nutcrackers and plates all feature in the exhibition. The statues are made from stone, pottery and wood, but devils are also painted on silk or canvas. Some of the beasties have horns, others pointy tails, while still others are hairy. Imposing black and red colour schemes are the norm, though a few more dignified looking Jack-in-the-Greentype works add variation to the collection.

Contributions from countries as diverse as Mexico, Japan and Cuba are all on display alongside the Slavic artefacts, as is folk art from the indigenous peoples of Siberia. The stairways between each floor are decorated with macabre etchings, large-scale paintings or lively caricatures.

The second floor offers wooden carvings, mostly from Slavic countries. These are particularly striking, intricately carved in the finest detail so as to be almost lifelike.They offer a deeper insight into the devil's traditional role in rural society. Antanas Kazlauskas' work covers a range of scenes, including a devils' meeting in the woods, and their pursuit by a team of hunters, intent on retribution.

Kazys Dereskevicius goes one step further, using folk art to make a political point. His main piece, 'The Division of Lithuania', features Hitler and Stalin as two fork-tailed devils, dancing on a pile of human skulls. Unsurprisingly, this was only allowed on public view after 1989.

The first floor houses the work of local Kaunas artist Antanas Zmuidzinavicius, which forms the original nucleus of the collection. His specifically Lithuanian take on the devil archetype shows people battling with, and then riding on, goat-devils. Occasionally the scenes are gruesome and violent, the unfortunate suffering a pitchfork to the head, but in general they seem quietly and sardonically comical. Sometimes the men drink with the devil; in other carvings they lasso him by the horns. One piece shows the devil giving a man a piggyback; here they look like happy schoolboys rather than sworn enemies. Zmuidzinavicius' devils seem to represent the sometimes tame but often unpredictable forces of nature, and the way setbacks can serve as a spur to man's own inventiveness.

The museum harbours an extra treat in the basement: a well stocked bar, which manages to pull off diabolical decor with taste and style. Although it was empty during my visit, I imagine it would make a perfect venue for drunken carousing in honour of the Lord of Misrule.

The guide, Arunas Stankunas, explained that when the museum opened in 1966, it housed 260 statues. Their previous owner, the aforementioned artist Antanas Zmuidzinavicius (1876-1966), was obsessed by the number 13, also known as the devil's dozen. (There may be some significance to the fact that 13 multiplied by 20 equals 260) He had obsessively collected them in contravention of Soviet law, which prohibited any religious artefacts. A collection of so much Lithuanian folk art also carried a covert nationalist, and hence anticommunist, message.

Zmuidzinavicius faced exile to Siberia should his devils be discovered. Following Khrushchev's thaw (after the death of Stalin in 1953), Zmuidzinavicius donated the entire collection to the state in 1966, anddied later the same year. The original museum was then located in the painter's house. Thanks to generous international donations, the diabolical throng has now swollen to over 2,000, and a special new building has been built to house the numerous fiends.

Given that the Soviet Union forcibly discouraged religious activity, I was surprised to learn that the museum had been State-owned even in the period of more liberal communism. Yet it appears that the Lithuanians have always clung proudly to their Pagan heritage. Arunas claimed that Lithuania was the last Pagan state in Europe, with an unbroken tradition of Pagan practice in rural areas lasting until the early 19th century.

He went on to explain that Eastern Europeans have a different view of the devil from that commonly held in the West. "The devil is very close to man, he represents a part of ourselves," he told me.

In such a view, the devil is part of the natural world, and in some ways a personification of the forces of nature.The devil is also a joker, though one with a sick sense of humour, and is motivated by mischief rather than outright evil. In many ways he is similar to the Norse god Loki, another earthy figure deeply involved in the affairs of men, and a thorn in the side of the organised and predictable. He is associated with chaos, always on hand to stir up trouble if things look to be going too smoothly. In Pagan times the devil had equal status with the gods, accepted by the people as a normal part of life; it was only after the advent of Christianity that he was reviled and demonised.

Unlike the popular Western view of Satan as a potent source of terror, or of demons as the powerful representatives of evil, the East European devil is fallible, operating on the same The devil is a joker with a sick sense of humour level as man. If we are clever we can beat him. Arunas believes the collection to be humorous rather than sinister, and seemed surprised when I asked him if the museum ever received unwelcome attention from Satanists, or criticism from the religious establishment.

After a little prompting, he revealed the story of a group of Polish priests who came over the border for a visit. Although initially reluctant to enter, due to their fear of contamination by Pagan idols, they eventually plucked up the courage, resolved on getting to know their enemy. They were so thorough in their research that they were found downstairs in the bar several hours later, downing shots of vodka.

I was told that the majority of visitors come from neighbouring Latvia and Poland, though since the fall of communism people do arrive from further afield. This would suggest that the Slavic fascination with the devil legends is still current. After all, it has survived Soviet rationalist re-education, even cropping up in underground literature of that period, such as Mikhail Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita.

Slavic Paganism is itself undergoing a renaissance: traditional folk celebrations are again popular, and overtly Pagan groups are springing up throughout the former Soviet Union.

The museum appeals to all ages, and now offers a multilingual guide to accommodate foreign visitors. Arunas suggested that the continuing appeal of devil myths demonstrates our link with a mostly forgotten Pagan past. This is borne out by the perennial place of the devil in all aspects of our culture, from the numerous reworkings of Faust and films like Kevin Smith's Dogma, to the careless phrases, such as "speak of the devil," that we still use every day. I came away wondering if the artists believed that a carved devil is trapped in one form, and thus protects its maker, rather like a bound demon. Perhaps these artworks are really a continuation of man's battle with the Horned One in a new form?

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