The life and work of Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski, a well-known public and political figure of the Belarusian People’s Republic, a talented architect, and one of the founders of the modern national architectural school, could fill books and monographs: his figure is so interesting and multifaceted in the recent history of Belarus. But first and foremost, he was a sincere Catholic and a benefactor who cared for the Church and looked after good people, regardless of their religious and national affiliation or political beliefs. To outline the main aspects of Dubeykaŭski’s personality, two words will suffice: Man and Christian.
| Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski, consul of the BNR in Warsaw. 1919. (BDAMLiM). |
Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski was born on July 7, 1869 (according to his wife, Yulianna — in 1867; the days of the month are given according to the old style) in the hamlet of Dubeykava, Mstsislaw district, Mogilev province.
Leon Dubeykaŭski came from an ancient noble family that traces its origins back to approximately the 14th century, during the existence of the principality of Mstsislaw. Once a wealthy family, it fell into poverty and decline during the partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. No longer distinguished from the local peasants by legal or material status, the Dubeykaŭskis steadfastly adhered to old traditions, worthy of noble dignity and the faith of their ancestors.
| L. Dubeykaŭski with his parents. Drawing by Warsaw artist F. Palkonski, made in 1901. (National Museum of History and Culture of Belarus. Published for the first time). |
The head of the family, Yan Dubeykaŭski, was a strict and proud man who lived according to the old ancestral laws. He did not always have the tact and understanding in relation to his son, whom he punished more than once for childish misdeeds. From his father, young Dubeykaŭski inherited the same principledness and pride, masculine dignity, and passion for his work.
Leon’s mother, Agapa, from the family of Dzeruzhynski, on the contrary, was characterized by a cheerful and gentle nature, had an approach to everyone, and found the right word for each. All the surrounding peasants turned to Aunt Agapa for advice, coming with their ailments, as she had remedies for every ailment, and invited her to be their midwife, for which the neighboring children affectionately called her “grandma.” “At weddings or funerals,” wrote Yulianna Dubeykaŭska, according to her husband’s memories, “she was the first to start singing the appropriate song, and her deep religiosity, where everything was accepted as a manifestation of God’s will and grace, completed the spiritual richness of this gifted nature, which knew no conflicts or dissatisfaction… She and her husband were whole natures, who firmly adhered to the testament of their parents and faith, lived one way — ‘as God commanded.’ Thanks to her mother, her living connection with the Church, the Belarusian folk tales, proverbs, and songs heard from her lips, Leon Dubeykaŭski from a young age lived with God in his heart, with love for his people and their traditions. It was his mother who first introduced Leon to the Belarusian word. Growing up, Dubeykaŭski began to collect Belarusian folklore, independently processing oral folk works, and tried to write himself. He is the author of the fable “The Wolf Will Pull — The Wolf Will Pull” and the poem “Storm,” written in the early 1890s. Later, Dubeykaŭski greatly regretted that in his youth he did not record his mother’s sayings and songs, as this would have been a true treasury of folk epic.
| The church in Mstsislaw, where L. Dubeykaŭski was baptized. (National Museum of History and Culture of Belarus.) |
After graduating from the Mstsislaw city school, Leon faced the question of choosing his further life path. There was no money for education at the local gymnasium in the family. Young Dubeykaŭski categorically refused his father’s offer to become a clerk: it would be better for him to plow and mow than to spend his whole life copying office papers. His thoughts had long been occupied with the dream of dedicating himself to the construction of God’s sanctuaries, the homes and palaces needed by people.
Even in childhood, Leon was fascinated and impressed by the grandeur and harmony of the architecture of both local churches and Orthodox temples. When builders restored the old church, he would spend whole days asking carpenters and masons about the secrets of their craft. From those masters, young Dubeykaŭski learned that there was a special construction school in Warsaw.
At the age of 17, against his father’s wishes, Leon Dubeykaŭski set off for Warsaw and enrolled to study construction. To earn money for his education and living expenses, he worked part-time on construction sites in the evenings. He diligently and eagerly mastered this new craft, always ranking among the top students.
Leon returned home only after two years, already holding a diploma as a professional builder. From the early 1890s, Dubeykaŭski led the restoration of Catholic sanctuaries in Mstsislaw, Mogilev, Orsha, Krychaw, Chacherysk, in the towns of Svislach in the Osipovich district and Smalyany in the Orsha district. During the reconstruction of the Smalyany church, he had the fortune to work alongside architect Dawksh, a well-known master of his craft. His acquaintance with him greatly influenced Dubeykaŭski’s subsequent professional choices.
During the restoration of one of the churches in Mogilev province, Dubeykaŭski became closely acquainted with a young local priest who introduced him to Belarusian literature. The first Belarusian book for Leon was “The Belarusian Pipe” by Francišak Bahuševič. Captivated by the poems, Dubeykaŭski, along with his friend, copied them and memorized them. This was the beginning of the growth of his national consciousness. Feeling himself to be Belarusian was also aided by his close acquaintance with Mogilev priest Stanisław Dzenisevich, a future archbishop and author of “Elementarz dla dobrych dzieci katolików” (St. Petersburg, 1906), written in Belarusian.
| The church in Smolensk, built by L. Dubeykaŭski in 1897. |
Having received a patent for the construction of the Smolensk church in 1896, Leon Dubeykaŭski moved to Smolensk for permanent residence. In 1897, with the aim of better organizing his own construction business, he founded the private engineering company “L. Dubeykaŭski and Co,” and a year later — a factory for reinforced concrete products. Along with the construction of civil buildings, Dubeykaŭski, at the request of local Orthodox priests, built churches in Yartsevo and Monastyryshchyna in the Smolensk province…
To improve his knowledge and qualifications in construction, Dubeykaŭski later went to study in St. Petersburg, where, a year later, he passed exams externally for the title of engineer-architect at the Institute of Civil Engineers.
But the main goal of his life was still ahead. During the Russo-Japanese War and the revolutionary events of 1905-1906, when construction entrepreneurship in Russia was experiencing a decline, Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski decided to liquidate his business (selling his factory, depositing money in the bank) and went to study in Paris at the architectural school (Ecole Special d’Architecture). In Paris, he learned the secrets of the best architects who were then the trendsetters of European architecture. Among his personal papers, which have been preserved and are now in the Belarusian State Archive-Museum of Literature and Art, there are a large number of sketches of the interior and exterior decoration of Notre-Dame (Cathedral of Paris), and in the National Museum of History and Culture of Belarus, there are his architectural projects of civil buildings made under the influence of French modernism, including his diploma work: “Gimnaze Fagade…”. Among the architectural designs of Dubeykaŭski preserved in museums of Belarus, there are several projects of churches executed in neo-Romanesque and neo-Gothic styles, but precise dating is absent.
| L. Dubeykaŭski at the drawing board during his studies at the Architectural School in Paris. 1909. (BDAMLiM. Published for the first time.) |
Having received a diploma as an architect-artist in 1910, Dubeykaŭski got a job in Warsaw at the private architectural and construction bureau of Lilpop and Jankowski. Gaining three years of professional experience and accumulating the necessary capital, Leon created his own design firm for the construction of industrial and residential buildings. At the same time, he taught construction at the Warsaw Secondary Industrial and Technological School of Engineer Piotrowski. According to his project, a factory for the Ring brothers and a number of apartment buildings in Warsaw were built. In the circle of local architects and builders, Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski enjoyed a well-deserved reputation; he was a member of the “Koło architektów w Warszawie.” A milestone for him was the work on a private project of a palace ensemble on Flora Street, 7 in Warsaw, which he executed in the style of European modernism. Preparatory work for the construction of the architectural complex began in early 1914, but due to the outbreak of World War I, further work was unfortunately halted.
While being outside Belarus, Dubeykaŭski did not sever ties with his homeland. The architect regularly subscribed to the Belarusian press and literature, corresponded with the editorial offices of the newspaper “Nasha Niva” and the Catholic weekly “Biełarus.” He visited Vilnius several times, where he became closely acquainted with the leaders of the national movement: the Lutskievich brothers, Wacław Ivanowski, Uladzimir Stalyhva, Fr. Francišak Budzka, and others, materially assisting the publishing community “Zahlyane sonca i u nasha vakontsa.” Ivanowski was concerned about Dubeykaŭski’s relocation to Vilnius for the vacant position of city architect, but these plans were disrupted by the war…
In the autumn of 1916, Dubeykaŭski arrived in St. Petersburg, where he received an unexpected offer from Fr. Francišak Budzka to create a project for a Belarusian church.
At the same time, in the northern Russian capital, a national circle was formed by young clerics, students of the St. Petersburg Catholic Academy, which laid the foundation for the Belarusian Christian Democracy. The soul and one of the main organizers of the community was the aforementioned Fr. Budzka, a sincere supporter of Belarusian identity. Together with his associates, Budzka founded the newspaper “Świetač” (which published only 7 issues), but his main dream was to create the first Belarusian Catholic parish, where sermons and additional services would be conducted in Belarusian. Fr. Budzka, who had been a vicar in Polotsk for several years, acquired a small estate in the village of Yanatruda in the Polotsk district on credit and built a chapel there. The next step was to be the construction of a church. The priest hoped to obtain funds for its construction from Princess Magdalena Radziwiłł. He commissioned Dubeykaŭski to design the sanctuary itself. The architect was given a specific task — to build the church in a national Belarusian style.
| Earlier projects of churches by L. Dubeykaŭski. Exact dating is absent. (National Museum of History and Culture of Belarus. Published for the first time.) |
In starting to execute the project, Dubeykaŭski mentally returned to the times when he had to restore ancient Christian sanctuaries in Mogilev, Vitebsk, and Smolensk. Even then, he became seriously interested in folk wooden architecture. Later, he often recalled the old Orthodox church built during the time of the Union, in the second half of the 17th century, next to Dubeykava, in the village of Vialikaye Pirahova. Externally, it resembled an ordinary peasant house, composed of three logs of different widths, which formed a single tectonic integrity through a tent-shaped shingle roof with overhangs resting on rafters. Above the belfry rose a tower that had several tiers. All this gave the sanctuary a strict grandeur and concise expressiveness. The church stood until the early 1890s. But the priest who arrived from Russia did not like its “Uniate appearance.” Ordering it to be dismantled, he built a new temple in its place, but already in the “strict Russian style.” All this happened before the eyes of Leon Dubeykaŭski. And how many such disgraceful facts of the destruction of Belarusian architectural heritage he witnessed — only God knows. At the end of the 19th century, the Russian Orthodox Church destroyed dozens, hundreds of Uniate sanctuaries that constituted a true treasure of folk architecture.
Relying on the traditions of Belarusian builders, Dubeykaŭski gradually developed his own architectural style. He brilliantly manifested his talent while working on the project of the Yanatruda church. “The task,” he later wrote, “was, although pleasant, quite difficult, for in literature — neither technical nor architectural — there was no mention of Belarusian style. But, as it should be — it must be done! Left without literary support, I deeply contemplated the task, the idea of our style, and designed the church.” The architect modestly noted: “Indeed, not entirely my merit here — mainly the thoughts of Our People helped.” We can say that in this and his further works, Dubeykaŭski revealed himself as a true innovator and creator.
Fortunately, the original project of the church in Yanatruda has been preserved in the National Museum of History and Culture of Belarus, which indicates the exact date of execution — November 1916. According to the project, the church was to be a structure of a regular log cabin, which would not be clad with boards or plaster, without artificial decor. Principally — only wood. The building was to have a large spacious nave and a four-tiered bell tower above the choir. On the side of the main entrance, there was to be a gallery on four masonry columns. The roof of the gallery embraced the tower, creating a single space with a common roof. The edges of the shingle roof overhung far over the walls, bending upwards on long rafters. The simplicity and at the same time the dynamism of the structure, the original construction, the perfect technical execution of the roof and multi-tiered tower — all this gave the church an unparalleled image. One can agree with art historian Syarhei Khareuski, who expressed the opinion that the Yanatruda church could equally serve as a prototype for a temple for Catholics, Orthodox, and Protestants, as it concentrated the traditions of centuries of Christianity in Belarus.
| Project of the church in Yanatruda, Polotsk district. November 1916. (National Museum of History and Culture of Belarus. Published for the first time.) |
Thanks to the efforts of Bishop Edward Ropa, Francišak Budzka managed to obtain approval from the official Russian authorities for the project of the church in Yanatruda. But the February Revolution of 1917 disrupted all the plans of the Belarusian priest. Spiritually exhausted, Fr. Budzka fell seriously ill for a long time, and on February 2, 1920, on Candlemas, he died prematurely, never achieving his main goal in the last years of his life. This sad news greatly affected Dubeykaŭski, “enveloping him in heavy sorrow.” His “symphony of architectural poetry,” as he himself expressed it, remained unfinished.
The period from 1917 to 1921 was entirely devoted to the Belarusian national cause. Dubeykaŭski moved to Belarus shortly before the Bolshevik coup, finding refuge in the estate of Mikhaŭtsy near Radashkovichy, in the residence of Belarusian writer and political figure Alexander Ulasau. Dubeykaŭski sincerely welcomed the Act of March 25, wishing to dedicate all his talent and energy to the restoration of the independence of his homeland.
From June 1, 1918, by the decision of the People’s Secretariat of Belarus, Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski was appointed the chief government architect of the BNR. He began to develop samples of state national awards (the sketches of these samples are preserved in the Belarusian State Archive-Museum of Literature and Art). By government order of the BNR, in the summer of that same year, the architect completed the project for the building of the First Belarusian National Gymnasium in Budslaw. Receiving a government financial subsidy, Dubeykaŭski personally went there and headed the construction. However, the Polish occupation did not allow him to complete the initiated work. By order of the new administration, the Budslaw Belarusian gymnasium was liquidated as a “shelter for Bolshevism.”
| Ukrainian priest Fr. Isafat Zhan (left) visiting Leon Dubeykaŭski with an unknown person. Warsaw, 1920. (BDAMLiM. Published for the first time.) |
At the beginning of the Polish occupation, Leon Dubeykaŭski still had illusions that the idea of solidarity with the Belarusian people would prevail in Polish society, that the western neighbor, guided by the old call of the insurgents of 1863 “For our and your freedom!” — would help the Belarusians create an independent state and free themselves from Moscow’s shackles. To promote understanding between Polish and Belarusian intelligentsia, he became one of the initiators of the creation of the Polish-Belarusian Society in the autumn of 1919, which included Princess Magdalena Radziwiłł, Count Chapski, Edward Vainilovich, and other prominent figures. But soon the illusions disappeared. Firmly adhering to the idea of independence of his native homeland, Dubeykaŭski boldly spoke out in the Belarusian press against Polish chauvinism. When the Belarusian Social Democratic Party was organized, he joined its ranks. Knowing Dubeykaŭski’s good connections in Warsaw, the chairman of the Council of Ministers of the BNR, Anton Lutskievich, appointed him as consul of the Belarusian government in Poland. This happened on June 15, 1919. At that time, Dubeykaŭski had a good job (the position of architect in the town of Janów in the Lublin Voivodeship), but realizing his moral responsibility to his people and country, he left his lucrative position and moved to the Polish capital to defend the interests of Belarus. In October 1919, he initiated the creation of the Warsaw Belarusian National Committee, performing the duties of its chairman. Dubeykaŭski held himself with dignity as a representative of the Belarusian People’s Republic and did everything possible and impossible for the benefit of the Belarusian cause.
An important chapter in the biography of Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski was his charitable work in Belarusian children’s shelters in Hrodna and Białystok. After the mass arrests of activists of the Belarusian movement in Hrodna province by the Polish defense in 1921 and the liquidation of national organizations, the wards of these shelters were left without material support, practically abandoned to die of hunger. Dubeykaŭski knocked on the doors of Polish ministries, appealed to charitable societies in Poland, Germany, England, the USA, and other countries to find funds for the needs of orphaned children.
It is impossible to read the lines from the letters of the head of the Hrodna children’s shelter, Stanislava Buiłanka (a sister of Belarusian poet Konstantin Buiło-Kalechits) to Dubeykaŭski without emotion.
From a letter dated September 16, 1921: “Dear Grandpa! ‘When in trouble, turn to God.’ So do I. Now we live so poorly without money that… out of this trouble, I sat down to write to you. Maybe, Grandpa, you can beg for a little money somewhere… We do not receive money from the government at all. Even at the Magistrate, they have not given us anything for 2 months… And here, as for our greater grief, prices have risen terribly this month. Every month we had an expense of 40 thousand, but this month the children were starving, and the expense was 70 thousand. I simply cannot look at the children. The windows are missing, the doors do not close. The children are lightly dressed, hungry; it is something terrible… I have fallen ill from all this and have been lying for two weeks, but it is good that I see and know nothing now… So soon it must be necessary to stop eating — there are only enough American products for another seven days. The situation is terrible… If you can, Grandpa, help in any way, then help.” From a letter dated October 7 of the same year: “Dear Grandpa! Forgive me for not writing earlier, for not thanking you for the help, which came very timely. Thank God, somehow a little money has flowed to us since then, and we are no longer starving, and we have put in a few windows. The delegate has long given us 35 thousand… Only there is no health, Grandpa, no health. Here is the trouble. When a fever rises to 39 [degrees], I lie like a log and prepare to die; then I am more certain that I will never get up again, but today I feel a little better, so again I make plans, again I live the life of a healthy person. Well, I have bored you, Grandpa, but this is still a cheerful letter. If I wrote at another time, I would have bored you even more with my writing…”
A few days later, Stanislava died. But her good deeds remained. The memory of those Belarusian children, for whom such noble people as Stanislava Buiłanka and Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski sacrificed their souls, their work, and their lives remained.
When there was no longer any possibility to maintain the children’s shelter in Hrodna, Dubeykaŭski took care to transfer the orphans to Vilnius, to the boarding school of the preparatory classes of the Belarusian gymnasium.
In reviewing the political activity of Leon Dubeykaŭski, one comes to a remarkable conclusion: the plenipotentiary representative of the BNR in Warsaw, an active member of the Belarusian Social Democratic Party, a participant in more than one political conference of the democratic forces of Belarus never became a professional politician. He always firmly adhered to the independence line, resolutely defended the national and social rights of his people, but always treated his opponents with tolerance, seeing a person in each, not an ideological enemy. He persistently fought against falsehood and insincerity, even against party discipline. He never swung to extremes with changes in political conjuncture. Thus, during the Prague nationwide political meeting of 1921, the architect defended against false accusations in the organization of Jewish pogroms by General Bulak-Bulakhovich, although he did not consider himself a friend of the latter, viewing him as an adventurer. Not accepting the program of revolutionary actions and the ideology of the Belarusian SRs, Dubeykaŭski nevertheless did everything possible to secure the release of activists of this party from prison by the Polish authorities. Thanks to Dubeykaŭski’s personal advocacy, one of the leaders of the revolutionary wing of the Belarusian liberation movement, Tomasz Gryb, as well as Paulina Myadzelka, Uladzimir Kurbski, Alexander Ulasau, and many others were released after long months in prison. The architect appealed to the Marshal of the Polish Sejm himself, requesting amnesty for Belarusian patriots convicted in 1922 in the case of the “45.”
Dubeykaŭski’s sincerity and openness brought him heavy blows of fate more than once. He had long become accustomed to the slanders and intrigues of ill-wishers. But only not to the betrayal of friends and associates.
In early 1922, Leon Dubeykaŭski’s candidacy was nominated by the Belarusian democratic association for election to the Senate of the Polish Sejm, but on the eve of the elections, at the request of Anton Lutskievich, the architect’s name was removed from the pre-election list. Through the left socialist press, the leader of the Belarusian social democrats hurled accusations at Dubeykaŭski of treachery to the Polish defense and betrayal of national interests. Such a blow to the back brought Dubeykaŭski close to suicide. The attempt to discredit the architect in the eyes of conscious Belarusian society was revenge for his refusal to join one of the Masonic lodges in Vilnius, to which Lutskievich himself belonged. Dubeykaŭski also showed nobility here, not telling anyone, except for his confessor, Fr. Adam Stankevich, the whole truth about this “affair.” On February 16, 1925, at a court of honor, in the presence of Fr. Adam Stankevich, lawyer Tadeusz Urublewicz, Uladzimir Samoila, and others, a condemnation was issued against Anton Lutskievich’s act as “inadmissible with regard to the good name of his political opponent and a person, an act that finds no justification.” Much earlier, Lutskievich, as if forgetting the emotional wound inflicted on the architect, began to seek friendship with Dubeykaŭski again, “to extend a hand for reconciliation” and to call him “under the old banner.” Dubeykaŭski refused such “sincerity” and completely withdrew from political affairs.
The architect was helped to withstand the blows of fate by his wife Yulianna, née Menke, the daughter of a German merchant who settled in Vilnius. Yulianna worked as a teacher at the Vilnius Belarusian gymnasium, was a sincere supporter of the Belarusian people and their national cause. Finally, the old bachelor was lucky to find a good woman, in whom he found a sincere beloved, a faithful friend, with whom he shared all joys and hardships until the end of his life. Their marriage was blessed on February 22, 1922, in the Vilnius church of St. Nicholas by Fr. Adam Stankevich. After the marriage of Francišak Kušal with Natallia Arsenneva, this was the second church ceremony in Vilnius conducted in Belarusian.
After all the life’s hardships, Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski directed all his energy and talent from the political field to the cultural and religious sphere.
From 1922, he settled in Vilnius and conducted a private architectural practice. In the same year, the architect designed a wooden church for Old Believers in the town of Vidzy, and a year later, he headed the reconstruction of the Bernardine walls for the Faculty of Arts of Vilnius University of Stefan Batory. According to Dubeykaŭski’s project, a private house was built on Slovatski Street. Finally, by the mid-1920s, he built his own family estate on Podgornaya Street, where he moved with his wife in 1926.
Dubeykaŭski did not sever ties with the Belarusian movement, collaborating mainly with Christian democratic organizations. He constantly donated money to the newspaper “Belarusian Krynitsa,” materially assisting Belarusian students in Vilnius and Warsaw.
In 1925, he founded a bricklaying school, wishing to pass on his rich professional experience to the youth. The school was created under difficult conditions, literally from scratch. Initially, there was neither its own premises, nor the necessary equipment, nor significant financial resources. In organizing the educational institution, Dubeykaŭski proved himself not only as a qualified and talented educator but also as a real administrator. In fact, he laid the foundations for a new vocational and technical education in Belarus. This experience, unfortunately, is forgotten and unclaimed today.
For his bricklaying school, the architect managed to adapt, after redesigning and reconstructing, the former brewery of the Lipki brothers. Gradually, the pedagogical council of the school acquired new equipment and educational inventory. To be fair, it should be said that the state helped in this endeavor. The tuition fee at the school was moderate. At Dubeykaŭski’s initiative, the poorest students were accepted at the state’s expense.
The architect sought to attract students from the village to study at the school, most of whom were Belarusians. For this, it was necessary to organize student boarding houses. However, the Vilnius administration did not allocate money for the dormitory. The head of the school went for a bold experiment. Instead of begging money from the authorities, he tried to earn it himself together with his students. From the older students, Dubeykaŭski created a mobile construction community and under his leadership, during the summer vacations, carried out orders for the construction of commercial warehouses, workshops, sanctuaries, and others. The construction of a wooden church in the town of Drisvyaty in the Braslaw region in 1929 is the best example of what Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski created together with his 16-18-year-old assistants.
The project of the Drisvyaty church was executed by the architect back in 1924 at the request of the local parish council. Only in 1927 did Dubeykaŭski begin its practical implementation. The construction of the sanctuary was carried out in a short time — in just two summer seasons of 1927 and 1929. The church was built on the site of an old sanctuary from the 15th century, on a high hill of an ancient castle, overlooking the wide Drisvyaty lake.
| Exterior view of the church in Drisvyaty. |
In the composition of the Drisvyaty church of Saints Peter and Paul, the traditions of Belarusian ancient architecture merged with modernist elements that organically fit into the overall context of the architectural work. The rectangular building of the sanctuary with a three-sided altar apse, a belfry, and sacristies is covered with a complex-shaped gable roof. The main facade is highlighted by a steep 5-tiered bell tower (the 1st-2nd tiers are executed as quadrangular, the 2nd-3rd — octagonal, the 4th-5th — cylindrical). The bell tower is compositionally connected to a signature tower, lower in height and more developed. These two towers symbolize the canonical unity of the holy apostles — Peter and Paul. The main entrance to the church is framed by arches on four masonry columns. The interior of the church is divided into naves by 8 columns. The ceiling is coffered with ornamental painting. Above the belfry, there are choirs. The Drisvyaty sanctuary has much in common with Dubeykaŭski’s project of the Yanatruda church, which has already been discussed here. When erecting the temple in Drisvyaty, only wood and concrete were also used. The external decoration completely lacked decor. Indeed, the hewn walls of the Drisvyaty church were clad with boards, in which rectangular arched and round windows were cut out. The architect also used the original technique of log cabin construction he developed while working on the Yanatruda church project and other innovations in wooden construction. “It is a pleasure,” the architect would later write, “to boast of a monumental structure — a wooden, three-nave church… in Drisvyaty, in the Braslaw district… the walls are smooth, in the joints, between the crowns, not a trace of moss or bark is visible, the ceiling is laid, and at the edges of the beams, there is a carved cord… and all individual fragments are artistically executed, and in general give a sympathetic synthesis… monumental form, reminiscent of our Belarusian style.” Dubeykaŭski’s merit is also that he organically integrated his architectural work into the surrounding landscape. The architect’s principle that human habitation and the temple should be an extension of the temple of nature was successfully embodied during the construction of the Drisvyaty church.
With the money earned during the summer months, Dubeykaŭski organized courses for out-of-town students, and the remaining money was deposited in the bank. From the income that came from bank interest, a separate monetary fund was collected for the graduates of the school. On graduation day, former students, along with certificates of completion from the school, received an additional 100-150 zlotys.
But even after his students left the school, their former teacher did not forget about them. In 1927-32, when an economic crisis began and was in full swing in Poland, Dubeykaŭski organized a construction cooperative from his former students, which, thanks to the entrepreneurship and organizational talent of its leader, had a certain income and provided work for young people. It should be noted that Dubeykaŭski did not take any money for his leadership. Today, one would say: he worked on a voluntary basis.
The school that the architect managed was planned from the very beginning as an educational institution for training builders-bricklayers. But, in love with wooden construction, understanding its great importance for the needs of the region, the architect created a carpentry department at the bricklaying school. The training of carpenters was brought by Dubeykaŭski to a high level, which was repeatedly noted by the Ministry of Construction of Poland. In 1927, the educational institution was renamed the School of Building Crafts. The number of students grew to 120 people. A free cafeteria was organized at the boarding houses. In addition to the carpentry department, it was planned to open departments for training steelworkers and bakers. Dubeykaŭski made a project for a new school building, for which he selected one of the city’s vacant lots. Although the education at the school was conducted in Polish, Dubeykaŭski sought to convey to students the ideas of national revival in his lectures and practical classes, helping them to realize themselves as Belarusians.
However, such patriotic education in the Belarusian spirit did not please the higher Polish authorities. From the Vilnius curatorial office, to which the school was subordinate, discrediting and bureaucratic pressure began. Dubeykaŭski was forced to leave the director’s position and transfer to another job.
Experiencing his departure from the school, he fell seriously ill in early spring and was operated on in a local hospital. After recovering, Dubeykaŭski left teaching and resumed his private architectural practice.
| View of the Druya monastery of the Marian Fathers during reconstruction under the guidance of L. Dubeykaŭski. 1930s. (National Museum of History and Culture of Belarus.) |
The 1930s were relatively calm in the architect’s life. Now he had more time for public work. Dubeykaŭski was elected chairman of the parish council at the Vilnius church of St. Nicholas, actively worked in the Belarusian Institute of Economy and Culture. In the institute’s residence and within the walls of the church itself, he gave lectures on the history of Belarusian architecture. When a group of Fr. Vincents Hadleŭski separated from the Belarusian Christian Democratic organization and began to create its own newspaper “Belarusian Front,” Dubeykaŭski materially assisted it. In 1934-1938, at the request of Father Andrei Tikota, the architect managed the reconstruction of the monastery for the order of the Marian Fathers in Druya, as well as the Franciscan cathedral in Vilnius, and made a project for a Catholic monastery in Niepokalanów near Warsaw. In the summer, during vacations, he diligently tended to his garden and his own apiary, and in winter, he finished the main work of his life — “The Evolution and Reform of Wooden Construction,” where he examined the history of wooden architecture and the construction of towns and cities in Belarus. In the introduction to his work “How to Build a House” (1937), he wrote: “In Belarusian literature, there is still nothing about our wooden construction, and if something is found on the book market, it is in a foreign, little or not at all understandable language for Belarusians, and of foreign cut, with shortcomings in processing and our economic needs, as well as the traditions of Belarusian wooden construction. And this is our grievance.
Every nation that does not defend its traditions in general, and especially in construction — loses its natural features, its native culture, and thus — strives for the obliteration and death of its people.
The Belarusian People, having been in political and economic captivity for many centuries — has weakened and descended to a primitive life, preserving only its one natural treasure — the language, and also guarding its everyday traditional customs, but it did not have the material strength to maintain the traditional features of its construction, which was constantly being destroyed, sometimes by fires and numerous military events, and it — declined.
The ancient achievements of wooden construction, which can still be seen here and there: — like bell towers, churches, and other remnants of ruins, are the last witnesses in the history of Belarusian construction, proving our past.
Such a state of decline of wooden construction in general, and especially now, when the village is dispersing into separate households of single-farm settlements (huts), prompted me to a comprehensive processing of plans for three houses: a smaller, medium, and larger farm house, as well as two houses for urban intelligentsia, so that, having an example and professional knowledge, our People would strive for cultural construction based on their traditional forms of architecture and economic order.”
The architect dreamed of a new face for the Belarusian city and village. For this, he designed beautiful, bright houses, made in the traditions of national architecture, and of course, sanctuaries, where a person could rest his soul.
In the harsh winter of 1939-40, Dubeykaŭski suffered from a severe flu. But misfortune usually does not come alone: he was struck by stomach cancer. The architect was dying in the hospital when the incoming Bolshevik authorities ordered the medical staff to remove the wall crosses in the wards. Seeing this, Dubeykaŭski quietly asked his wife, who sat unwaveringly by him: “Flower, take me home, for I want to die by the cross.”
Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski died on November 6, 1940. After a mourning Mass at the Franciscan church in Vilnius, his body was buried in the local Catholic cemetery of Rossa. In March 1941, his wife Yulianna took care to place a memorial stone with a cross on her husband’s grave. On the monument, besides the name and dates of birth and death, are the words that Leon often repeated during his life: “Do not grieve, as those who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13). In these words lies all the Truth: as long as God is with us — Hope lives.
The author of the publication sincerely thanks the staff of the National Museum of History and Culture of Belarus for their assistance in searching for materials for the biography of Leon Vitán-Dubeykaŭski.