The Cloak of Duke Gediminas presented in the Vincas Grybas museum

Enamel is a difficult art to control. Always expect the unexpected, which often fascinates, surprises, but sometimes can also disappoint. And when that happens – you either remain disappointed, or you throw the failed work aside – you start working on another one, because you won’t be able to clean or rub the enameled copper plate anymore. Enamel is a hard, glassy material that covers a metal, usually gold, silver or copper.

The enamel coated on the metal is heated at a temperature of 800 degrees, it melts and turns glass. This luxurious art, which is much older than Christianity, celebrates its 40th anniversary in Lithuania this year. In the document room of the Vincas Grybos Memorial Museum, you can see and closely examine the enamel art object-installation created on the occasion of Vilnius’ 700th birthday – “The Cloak of Duke Gediminas”.

The author of this complex creative initiative is Marytė Dominaitė, an enamel artist, organizer and curator of professional enamel art biennials in Lithuania. Three hundred non-Vilnius and Vilnius residents, as well as guests of the capital from six to eighty-six years of age, participated in the project. From 700 original enameled copper plates, they created a collective piece and left a piece of their legend of the Iron Wolf. On the enamel plates you can see many different images of wolves, motifs of the city of Vilnius and interpretations of Lithuanian symbols.

With steel rings, the enamel plates were connected into one large “Duke Gediminas Cloak”. The first enamel-decorated plates of the work were launched on February 11, 2023 at the Vincos Grybos Memorial Museum. Soon, the artist Marytė Dominaitė continued the implementation of this work in cooperation with the Tomas Zanas library, the Justinas Vienožinskis art school, the “Skaistis” tun of the Vilnius region scouts, with the social care home of the Vilnius city municipality “Vilniaus Lakštingala namai”, many participants joined this project in the XIX International Baltic during the jewelry exhibition “Amber Trip”. “Duke Gediminas’ Cloak” caused a lot of pleasant emotions for everyone who came to the presentation of this work.