The way through the mountains

The motif of the winding serpentine road through the mountains, also found in the paintings of M. K. Čiurlionis (The Funeral Symphony (1903), The Serpent’s Sonata (1908), express the mutual impact that the student and the teacher had on each other. The allusion to a serpent in this painting is not accidental. The Lithuanian word for serpent, žaltys, comes from the words želti and žaliuoti, meaning to sprout and to grow green respectively. K. Stabrowski never tried to hide his Lithuanian origins, so the interpretation of the serpent, a symbol of the never-ending revival of nature, could not be unfamiliar to him. On the other hand, snakes and serpents in other cultures and beliefs also symbolise eternity, a vital creative power of the universe, and these creatures are sometimes considered the intermediaries between this world and the world beyond it. This image was very convenient for symbolising a road that leads from the worldly realm into the spiritual one, expressed as the mysterious mountain settlement, engulfed in a hazy blueness.