About the place

Sculpture (narrating):

– When Luxembourg sculptor Maree Josee Kerschen visited Vilnius for the first time, people from Klaipėda invited her to come to Klaipėda the following summer and take part in the granite-carving symposium in Smiltynė.

Maree Josee Kerschen gladly accepted the invitation and became the first sculptor from Western Europe to come and create in Klaipėda at the end of the Soviet period.
Before starting work, the artist asked: what is Lithuania’s national bird?
What do you think the people of Klaipėda answered?
Passer-by:

– A woodpecker, pigeon, tit, owl… or perhaps a stork?

Sculpture:

– You guessed it. They told her that Lithuania’s national bird is the stork. In her work, the sculptor often depicted female-bird figures. So she developed this theme in Klaipėda as well, creating a legend about the Lithuanian desire to be free. There was still some waiting to do – it was only the summer of 1987, three years before the restoration of Lithuania’s independence. Yet after arriving in Lithuania, the sculptor felt that the Lithuanian nation was already ready for freedom. She depicted a stork-woman with her head tucked beneath her wing, preparing for flight. And flight means freedom.

Passer-by:

– But the sculpture is not called “Stork” or “Freedom”. The plaque says “Paukštulis”. Not “paukštelis”, not simply “paukštis”.

Sculpture:

– I agree, they gave me a beautiful name – Paukštulis. When the first information plaque was made, it said “Paukštelis”. The symposium organisers probably thought the sculptor had made a mistake. But no: Maree Josee Kerschen insisted that the title of the sculpture be corrected – it had to be “Paukštulis”.

Passer-by:

– Interesting, very interesting. That is how people in Dzūkija speak. Perhaps to the sculptor the word Paukštulis sounded closer to her native French – softly purring. P a u k š t u l i s (pronounced with a French accent)

Sculpture:

– Have you noticed that I am not carved from granite?

Passer-by:

– Of course I noticed. From basalt. Is that right?

Sculpture:

– Exactly. Klaipėda stonemason Jonas Virbauskas helped Maree-Josee Kerschen carve me from basalt – a craftsman with golden hands who put his chisel to almost every sculpture in this park.