Category: Faculty of Art and Culture

On Wednesday, August 19th at 15:00, pre-reviewing of Art and Design programme PhD student Ulvi Haagensen’s exhibition „From the Archive: a Collection of Funny Things” will take place at Tartu Art House Small gallery. Exhibition is part of the artistic (practice-based) doctoral thesis of Ulvi Haagensen.

Supervisors: Dr Liina Unt, Jan Guy (The University of Sidney).

Pre-reviewers of the exhibition: Villu Plink and Ester Bardone

The exhibition is open from 30 July to 23 August 2020.

This exhibition is by imaginary artist, Olive Puuvill, who creates work in the manner of a bricoleuse, cobbling, tinkering and using whatever is close at hand. In her latest work she combines patterns, lines, textures and light to create an installation where objects, situations, materials and ideas are juxtaposed in a slightly chaotic arrangement, but one that nonetheless has a logic of its own. All this bears the traces of her intentions, aims and ideas as physical evidence of the working processes where Olive’s everyday life clashes, meets and melds with her art practice.

Ulvi Haagensen’s doctoral research is about the line between art and everyday life. By merging a multi-disciplinary art practice that combines installation, sculpture, drawing, performance and video with everyday experiences – mainly cleaning, one of the more mundane aspects of everyday life – she works across and along the lines between everyday life and art to discover the lines, overlaps and boundaries between art and the everyday.

Together with three imaginary characters and using an autoethnographic approach that includes the methods, tools and attitudes of an artist who uses ‘what is at hand’ and ‘makes do’she uses the everyday, not only for inspiration, but also materials, tools and techniques.

As her characters move between their roles and various places of work and everyday life, they explore notions of the everyday and the specialness of art, especially from the viewpoint of an artist for whom art and art making are very much a part of the everyday and therefore quite un-special.

The annual conference of EKA Doctoral School takes place on June 10 at the Estonian Academy of Arts (Põhja pst. 7) room A101 and via Zoom.
To participate in the conference registration must be completed by June 8 the latest.

TIMETABLE 

10:00 – 10:15 Welcoming words

Vice Rector for Research Epp Lankots, head of programmes

Architecture and Urban Design 

10:15 – 10:55

Sille Pihlak. “Prototyping Protocols: Protocolling Prototypes* Identifying and systematising design methodology for contemporary modular timber architecture”. Discussant Markus Vihma

Art History and Visual Culture Studies

10:55 – 11:35

Merily Salura. “Flow and time: the temporality of a creative process in Gadamer’s aesthetics”. Discussant Maria Hansar

11:35 – 12:15

Hanna-Liis Kont. “From relational aesthetics to Arte Útil. Selected theoretical frameworks for analysing current curatorial practices related to community engagement and social wellbeing”. Discussant Darja Popolitova

12:15 – 12:45 coffee break

Art and Design

12:45 – 13:25

Ulvi Haagensen. “The art of cleaning: crossing the line between art and everyday life”. Discussant Merily Salura

13:25 – 14:05

Darja Popolitova. “Haptic Visuality of Jewellery”. Discussant Ulvi Haagensen

14:05 – 14:45

Markus Vihma. “Eco Design competencies”. Discussant Sille Pihlak

14:45 – 15:15 coffee break

Cultural Heritage and conservation

15:15 – 15:55

Maria Hansar. “Media Archeological Approach to the Archeological Monument – Narva Case Study”. Discussant Nele Rent

15:55 – 16:35

Nele Rent. “Changes in the use of terms and language over time on the example of the Heritage Protection Act”. Discussant Hanna-Liis Kont

16:35 – 17:00 concluding discussion

Exhibition „iTouch Store” Darja Popolitova

Vault Room of A-Gallery, Hobusepea 2, Tallinn

The exhibition can be visited from 31 Mayto 1 July 2019.
The opening will take place on 7 June at 6 p.m.

Darja Popolitova’s exhibition examines touch as a part of digital culture: the tactility of digitally transmitted jewellery images, given the excessive focus on the phone and the screen.

The audience can also see the works in their representations —in the form of a video ad where the author attempts to find answers to the following questions: can the digital representation of the jewellery have tactile features?, how does the digital representation of jewellery affect real jewellery on a tactile level? and, how does the use of digital media change the relationship between jewellery and tactility?.

The jewellery and objects at the exhibition are meant to solve the potential problems of the digital age. The titles of the work speak for themselves: “Hot Not Only Online Phone Case”, “Silicon Nail for Touching Screen”, “Digital Detox Brush”, etc.

The exhibition is laid out as a shop and this is not accidental. Media critic Erkki Huhtamo brings a parallel between a museum and a shop, the tradition of which is related to “tactiloclasms” — tactile rules and prohibitions in public places. Similarly to the old days where you could have access to the product in a shop only with the help of a shop assistant, in the exhibition room touching the jewellery is not permitted due to security requirements. Namita Gupta Wiggers, the jewellery historian, spoke of the fact that jewellery perception in the museum is limited to the vision, while the potential destination of the jewellery is the body.

Replacing the sense of touch with the vision continues in the Internet age. Darja Popolitova notes that she has been inspired by AliExpress e-shop ads. “Reviewing products —even without buying them —offers me certain pleasure,” commented the artist. “As I read a book by the media theorist Laura U. Marks, I went deeper into the meaning of the term “tactile visuality offered by Laura U. Marks. At one moment everything came together in my head: I treat the images of the products with a certain plasticity — my eyes do not see, but “touch” these images.That is why I decided to explore the tactile properties of the images of jewellery with my exhibition.”

Darja Popolitova was born in 1989 in Sillamäe and lives and works in Tallinn. She is currently doing a PhD at Estonian Academy of Arts. Darja designs jewellery using innovative technologies and mixed media. Recently, Darja Popolitova has participated in exhibitions at the Art and Design Museum in New York (2019), the Kunstnerforbundet gallery in Oslo (2018) and the fourth biennial of contemporary jewellery, METALLOphone in Vilnius (2018). Darja Popolitova is represented by the following galleries: Marzee in Nijmegen, Beyond in Antwerp, and Door in Mariaheide. Her work is included in the collection of the Estonian Museum of Applied Art and Design and also in private collections. The work of Darja Popolitova was awarded the scholarships of the Ministry of Culture and Adamson-Eric in 2018. She also received the scholarship of Young Jewellery in 2015.

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Video: Ando Naulainen

Sound Design: Andres Nõlvak

Graphic Design: Johanna Ruukholm

Artist’s gratitude goes to 3DKoda OÜ, A-Gallery, Adamson-Eric Museum,
Anastassia Dratšova, Benjamin Lignel, Daniil Popov, Doctoral School of Estonian Academy of Arts, Estonian Ministry of Culture, Kadri Mälk, Keiu Krikmann,
MakerLab Tallinn, Martina Gofman, Olesja Kulikova, Orbital Vox Stuudiod, Pire Sova,
Raivo Kelomees, Sarah Elizabeth Johnston, Shapeways Inc., Varvara Guljajeva, Vladimir Ljadov

The exhibition is supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

Date: June 4, 6, 7 at 10.00 to 17.00

Venue: Estonian Academy of Arts, Põhja pst 7, room A202

Lecturer: Benjamin Lignel

Artist, writer and curator Benjamin Lignel will conduct a 3-day seminar in June, focusing on the challenges and opportunities inherent to artistic research. We will be thinking through the temporalities of making, documenting, and argumenting, and the different sort of “proof” they invoke; we will attempt a 21st century autopsy of the author-function and look at subject-positions with the help of Italo Calvino, Joan Scott and Audre Lord; we will play at presenting an object (textual or physical) for public scrutiny with a view to understanding what “stewardship of ideas” might imply.

Students who sign up for the seminar will be required to read 3 texts in advance:

Audre Lord, the Use of Anger, Women responding to Racism (1981)

Joan Scott, The Evidence of Experience (1991)

Ulrike Müller, Herstory Inventory (2011)

You will also be required to write, in conversational/diaristic mode, how you first met an idea that subequently guided your current research (max. 500 words).

Registration

The seminar is open to PhD and MA students.

Registration form

Registration is open until 28.05.2019.

This event is organised by the Graduate School of Culture Studies and Arts, supported by the ASTRA project of the Estonian Academy of Arts – EKA LOOVKÄRG (European Union, European Regional Development Fund).

The Estonian Academy of Arts, Curriculum of Art and Design’s PhD student Varvara Guljajeva will defend her thesis “From interaction to post-participation: the disappearing role of the active participant”(“Interaktsioonist osalusjärgsuseni: aktiivse osaleja kaduv roll”) on the 21st of December 2018 at 12.00 at Põhja pst 7 building, room A101.

Supervisors:dr Raivo Kelomees (Estonian Academy of Arts) and dr Pau Waelder (The Open University of Catalonia)

Pre-reviewers:prof dr Christa Sommerer (Interface Cultures, The University of Art and Design Linz) and prof dr Moises Mañas Carbonell (Faculty of Fine Arts, Polytechnic University of Valencia)

Opponent: prof dr Christa Sommerer (Interface Cultures, The University of Art and Design Linz)

The practice-based dissertation analyses and contextualises passive audience interaction through the lens of post-participation. Research explores the shift from active to passive participation in interactive art. By exploring interactive art history and the discourse of identity within the field, this dissertation investigates how artworks that demonstrate no audience involvement, but still incorporate an internal system interaction with a data source, are addressed. In other words, the research tracks down the interest shift from human-machine to system-to-system interaction, and explores the reasons behind this.

In this thesis, a differentiation is made between direct and indirect post-participation. Hence, the selected artworks are analysed from the perspective of concept, direct or indirect post-participation components, and realisation. In addition, related artworks by other artists are introduced and discussed under each subcategory of post-participation.

In the end, the dissertation contributes to the evolution of interactive art, by analysing and contextualising passive audience participation in the form of post-participation. Author argues that the concept of post-participation helps to address the shift from an active to a passive spectator in the complex age of dataveillance, an age in which humans are continuously tracked, traced, monitored and surveilled without our consent.

Please find the PhD thesis here.

The defense will be in English.

Exhibition dates:

15.11.2018 12-18

16.11.2018 12-20

Sofia Hallik’s “Tangibility Matters” exhibition finissage takes place on Friday, November 16th, in the ARS Project Room at 18.00.

Peer-review event takes place in Nov 16th, at 14.00 in ARS Project Room (Pärnu mnt 154, Tallinn)

Supervisors: prof Kadri Mälk and dr Jaak Tomberg

Peer – reviewers: dr Kärt Ojavee and dr Raivo Kelomees

Works on display are made as a part of a PhD thesis, and consist of wearable objects that are a hybrid of hand work and digital production. While working on a jewellery, the author is in need of touch and tactility, while an object that is made using 3D printing appears as an empty form, which demands substance. In the world of tech, because the process of work using CAD or 3D printing excludes tangibility, the author is lacking physical contact with a work of art. That is exactly why in these series of works the artist razes in a way the digital tarnish from the surface of the printed object by implementing hand work and traditional jewellery techniques. In this way a 3D printed object gains emotional expressiveness.

The works presented during the exhibition originate from two contradictory principles: digital production and hand work, and embody the mutual closeness of human and the machine. In other words, while people approach the digital world, technology becomes more and more humane.

Sofia Hallik (1991) is a jewellery artist, designer and PhD student at the Estonian Academy of Arts. In her doctoral thesis “Hand vs. Machine: Three Methods of Jewellery Making” (supervisors prof. Kadri Mälk and Dr. Jaak Tomberg) Sofia focuses on innovative materials and digital technologies. What interests her the most is the way digital technology influences jewellery.

Special thanks to: Kadri Mälk, Jaak Tomberg, Oskar Narusberk, EAA Jewellery and Blacksmithing department, 3D Koda OÜ.

The exhibition was made possible with the support of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

Date: November 19, 2018 at 14.00 – 17.30

Venue: Estonian Academy of Arts, Põhja pst 7, room A502

Lecturer: Pia Sivenius

The idea of using psychoanalysis for artistic research seems tempting for artists in various fields, designers and architects. The aim of the seminar is to introduce the cornerstones of the theories of psychoanalysis and reflect on their uses in the field of arts. The seminar is open to PhD and MA students.

Pia Sivenius specialises in the French psychoanalysis theories. She has published numerous articles on the subject and translated the works of Lacan, Kristeva and Irigaray into the Finnish language. She is the long standing research coordinator in Aalto Arts (formerly University of Art and Design Helsinki) which gives her valuable insight into current artistic research.

Registration

Theseminar is open to PhD and MA students. Registration is open until16.11.

Registration form.

Program

14.00-15.30 seminar

15.30-16.00 break

16.00-17.30 seminar

Date:November 7-8, 2018

Venue: Estonian Academy of Arts, Põhja pst 7

Lecturer: Thomas Markussen

Research through design is about understanding how processes of designing and creating artworks can serve as the primary method of inquiry into questions relevant for art and design. Originally, the method was described by Christopher Frayling (1993) and Bruce Archer (1995), and since then many different suggestions for what the characteristics of research through design have been presented. This 2-day seminar offers PhD students visual sketching techniques and methodological tools that can be used to clarify how they practice research through design. Based on readings and the students’ position papers, we will be using visual models and diagrams to map out the role played by designerly and artistic experiments in the students’ own projects? Questions that will be addressed are: How can experiments in art and design serve as means for inquiry? How do we account for knowledge produced by these experiments? Each day will be framed by a talk that will set up a conceptual space for collective work.

Thomas Markussen is associate professor and co-founder of the Social Design Research Unit, at the University of Southern Denmark. In his work, Markussen focuses on how design can be used as a political and critical aesthetic practice, notably in the fields of social design, design activism and design fiction. He is one of the contributors to the recently published book Practice-based Design Research, edited by Laurene Vaughan, and has previously been head of phd education at Kolding School of Design. His other publications include journal articles such as “The disruptive aesthetics of design activism: enacting design between art and politics” (Design Issues); “Disentangling the ‘social’ in social design’s engagement with the public realm” (CoDesign); and “The politics of design activism – from impure politics to parapolitics” appearing in Routledge’s forthcoming book Design and Dissent.

Registration

Theseminar is open to PhD and MA students and researchers with ongoing research projects. Registration is open until 26.10.

Requirements

Particpants must submit a position paper (max 1 page) that describe their PhD project. The paper should provide understanding of the aim of the project, primary research questions, methods and the students training and background. Please send your paper to elika.kiilo@artun.eeby 30.10

As preparation for the seminar, participants will be asked to read:

Bang., A-L; Ludvigsen, M; Krogh P-G & Markussen, T. (2012):The Role of Hypothesis in Constructive Design Research. The Art of Research Conference, Aalto University, Helsinki.

Krogh, P-G; Markussen, T & Bang, A-L (2015): ICord’15 – International Conference on Research into Design, Springer Verlag.

The text will be made available upon registration.

Students can earn 2 credit points (ECTS) for participation.

Preliminary Program

Wednesday, Nov 7

13:00-14:00Introduction to Research through Design – a murky concept or expanding methodology?, talk by Thomas Markussen

Break

14:15-15:30 Group work – understanding the basic elements of research through design PhD projects

Break

15:45-16:30 PhD Poster exhibition

Thursday, Nov 8

9:30-10:30Ways of drifting – 5 methods for experimenting in research through design, talk by Thomas Markussen

Break

10:45-11:45 Group work on the role of designerly and artistic experiments in research through design PhD projects

Lunch

12:30:-13:15 Group work on the role of designerly and artistic experiments in research through design PhD projects

13:15-14:30 Collective sharing and presenting

This event is organised by the Graduate School of Culture Studies and Arts, supported by the ASTRA project of the Estonian Academy of Arts – EKA LOOVKÄRG (European Union, European Regional Development Fund).

The next lecturer of the Open Lecture Series this autumn semester will be Jason Hilgefort, stepping on the stage of the large hall of the new EKA building on 4th of October at 6 pm to talk about the disruptive developments of dispersed infrastructure.

Jason’s lecture is titled “Dispersed Infrastructures for New Collective Urban Constellations”. Cities began as a simple collection of individuals sharing common elements. They have slowly evolved to include megageopolitical networks. These systems have been manifested by large, far reaching governmental and corporate built forms. With the emergence of dispersed infrastructural realities (mobiles, drones, etc), we stand at a disruptive moment – where the assumed reliance of human habitat upon top down forms is in question. A new form of interdependent individuality is possible.

Jason studied urban planning and design at The University of Cincinnati and architecture at The University of British Columbia – Vancouver. His work experience ranges from New York (Ehrenkrantz Eckstut and Kuhn), to Los Angeles (Behnisch Architekten) to Mumbai (Rahul Mehrotra). From 2000 to 2004 he worked with Sustainable Urbanist and innovator Peter Calthorpe. After joining Maxwan A+U in 2007, he was involved in the ongoing projects Moscow A101, Central District Rotterdam, and Barking Riverside in London. Also, Jason lead a series of Maxwan’s competition victories – in Helsinki, Basel, Kiev, Hannover, Ostrava, Magdeburg, and Kaunas. During that time won Europan 11 in Vienna. Since then he formed Land+Civilization Compositions for investigating issues ranging from daily objects, to infrastructures, to cultural research. He is also a contributor to uncube magazine with writing on ‘architecture and beyond’.

Land+Civilization Compositions is a Randstad (Netherlands) and Istanbul (Turkey) based office that works and collaborates on issues related to built form, with a portfolio scope from research to design. According to LCC we are living at a time when the connections between the professions, which are engaged in the shaping of built form, are getting stronger and the differences amongst them are blurring. Glocal economic context, and emerging social and environmental issues are leading the way to a new set of priorities. A new generation of ‘urban thinkers’ is emerging and ‘process’ is becoming more prominent than the ‘product’.

The architecture and urban planning department of the Estonian Academy of Arts has been curating the Open Lectures on Architecture series since 2012 – each year, a dozen architects, urbanists, both practicing as well as academics, introduce their work and field of research to the audience in Tallinn. All lectures are in English, free and open to all interested.

The series is funded by the Estonian Cultural Endowment. Jason Hilgefort’s lecture is part of the Future Architecture program which introduces and celebrates innovation, experimentation and the ideas of a generation that will design the architecture and build Europe’s cities in the years to come. See: http://futurearchitectureplatform.org.

Curators: Sille Pihlak, Johan Tali
https://www.facebook.com/EKAarhitektuur/

More info:
Pille Epner
E-post: arhitektuur@artun.ee
Tel. +372 642 0071