Marius Gelžinis, Head of Lithuanian Airports:
Vilnius airport on the facade of the arrival terminal, above the entrance, we still have what some experts call a cultural heritage, and therefore an inviolable object - the Soviet realism sculptures "Pilot", "Aircraft Mechanic", "Paratroopers", "Pioneers with model airplanes" and several others. We have been talking about the fact that it is time to give up Soviet realism and the preservation of culture for several years, we argued about the functions that the "protected building" prevents from performing, but maybe enough about the functions and let's be clear - neither the possibilities of the functions, nor our value approach does not match what is displayed to millions of passengers in Vilnius.
At this time, when Lithuanian artists talk about the complete "closing of the sky" for Russian propaganda through culture in our country, when the public clearly says that they do not want to see and associate with what the Soviet war monuments standing in the cities symbolize, especially when we see what atrocities in Ukraine carried out by Russia - we are still obliged to protect and not touch the reflection of the reality of Sovietism Vilnius airport.
We talked, explained and tried to find a compromise with the Department of Cultural Heritage, but the replacement of the monuments of Soviet paratroopers and pilots on the facade of the airport (as well as the necessary transformation of the entire building) got stuck in hesitations and discussions about the need to preserve the legacy of the Soviet era. In the debate that it is heritage, it is culture, it is an inevitable part of history, the destruction of which will lead nowhere. Current events, especially the atrocities of the Russian army in Bucha, leave no doubt that the Soviet era in its most brutal form is still alive. Today, no one has any doubts anymore that the idealization of the Soviet era and the desire to preserve the attributes were just traps of soft power, in which a large part of Lithuanian intellectuals were also entangled. The truth is that there is no gray. There is only white and black. Or maybe more precisely white and red. Red from the blood, suffering and oppression of our nation. Now is a good time to ask ourselves again: is what we are protecting really valuable? What do we want these protected objects to remind us of?
What do we offer? In the near future, the entire list of cultural heritage and the objects built during the Soviet era will be fundamentally revised. There are really a lot of them. Their storage costs the state and the organizations that maintain them millions every year. Over the past year, we have to allocate over one million euros for the repair of the old arrivals terminal of Vilnius Airport alone. Undoubtedly, the list of objects to be protected contains many bright and truly valuable objects that commemorate our history, for the preservation of which these funds could be allocated, therefore we propose to delete the building of the arrival terminal of Vilnius Airport and all its parts from the lists of values to be protected as soon as possible, to allow us to carry out the transformation of the building, to remove the existing Soviet sculptures and finally step where there are more values of today, and not those that were relevant when Lithuanian people were sent to gulags for "denying Sovietism".
If necessary, we can repeat the arguments why we really do not need such a building in the long term, in all formats, meetings and conferences. Theoretical discussion must give way to action. We are ready for it.
Marius Gelžinis, Head of Lithuanian Airports
