Calendar

All the artworks in the exhibition “Total Jellification” are made of the same material – agar, a type of jelly that is made from seaweed. It is a natural material used for making desserts, puddings and custards, it is also used in microbiology for cultivating bacteria.

The exhibition “Total Jellification” is inspired by a phenomenon of jellification of the seas. A paper called “Jellification of Marine Ecosystems as a Likely Consequence of Overfishing Small Pelagic Fishes: Lessons from the Benguela” studies the consequences of overfishing in South Africa. Overfishing small pelagic fishes increases the biomass of jellyfishes. These small fishes can eat parts of jellyfish when they are not yet fully developed, but as they grow bigger, jellyfishes have virtually no predators. Thus the small fishes are important in managing the population of jellyfishes. The marine ecosystem has been completely transformed from the start of commercial fishing. But this isn’t only a problem for South Africa, the same processes have been discovered all around the globe and encounters with jellyfishes have also increased in the Baltic sea.

In this exhibition, jellification has been taken literally. Vent space has been transformed into an experimental space, where the possibilities of agar are explored. Agar jelly has been casted, moulded, dried, cut and for the opening the artist herself will also be jellified. The exhibition is an exploration of a quickly changing future, how to deal with the rapidly jellifying world.

The exhibition is supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia, Põhjala and Karksi Brewery.

Gelatex Technologies OÜ is a materials technology company that develops and produces nanofibrous materials. These consist of fibers that are up to 100 times smaller than a human hair. Gelatex focuses specifically on areas related to biotechnology, especially in vitro 3D cell culture and tissue engineering. There are also ongoing projects in the direction of drug development, wound treatment, and cultivated meat. Gelatex has an international team of enthusiasts and solution-oriented people with backgrounds in materials technology, mechanics, biochemistry, microbiology, marketing, sales and business development.

Exhibition ”Narratives from Prolonged Engagements”
Marta Konovalov

The exhibition ”Narratives from Prolonged Engagements” investigates our relationships with clothing and textiles from the perspective of mending with the aim to widen the boundaries of a garment’s use time and aesthetics.
Here the creative practice of Marta Konovalov is being displayed alongside narratives embodied in wear and repair. This act of repair contributes to a system for the clothes to live their own life in the hands of the user or multiple users, each adding up a new layer. There is more than sustaining the physical form – repairing something is also an act of love, care and personal healing.
This exhibition explores how layers of repair can increase the emotional durability of fashion and textiles. It is a part of doctoral research on the topic of “Repair and Regenerative textile Design” at Estonian Academy of Art.

Marta Konovalov is a designer, researcher and an educator in the field of regenerative design. She is a PhD student at the Estonian Academy of Arts. She currently makes mending visible in her creative practice with the aim to remind repair as a philosophy and inspire others towards the act of repair for prolonging the use phase of textile artefacts.

The exhibition takes place at the At Trash to Trend Stuudio, Müürivahe 17, Tallinn, Estonia from 14.11.-12.12.2023
A public textile repair workshop is being held with the exhibition on 9.12.2023
Peer review event: 20.11.2023 Info HERE.

Reviewers: Louise Ravnløkke PhD, Marium Durrani DA
Supervisors: Kristi Kuusk PhD, Julia Valle Noronha DA

Photo: Kärt Petser / Aurelia Minev
Exhibition design: Maarja Viiding & Marta Konovalov

Exhibition How to be Here by the 3rd year students of the department of painting at the Estonian Academy of Arts will be opened in the hall of exhibitions in the library of the University of Tartu at 18:00 on Monday, October 16th, 2023.

Participating artists are: Karola Ainsar, Anaïs Dubois, Maria Hindreko, Liisa-Lota Jõeleht, Stanislav Alexander Mihheljus, Daria Morozova and Marc Léger Sauvageot 

All artworks exhibited at the current venue have been completed during this autumn, during the seven-week long studio practice. Therefore, this exhibition serves as a transient gesture of the present moment, reminding of a leaving a quick handwritten note to the audience while asking the question: how to be here. 

During the third year of their BA studies, students increasingly dedicate themselves to searching for their artist statement and unique style that often develops throughout years. These young artists are at the beginning of this journey. Even their paintings are simultaneously similar and different. While sharing the studio space, the artists share other things as well – they are influenced by common ideas, conversations and working hours. Even when seeking their individuality, the shared workspace connects them with each other. The inevitable solitude of a painter and the skill as well as the desire to cope with this solitude is something that they still have to experience in the future. 

The artist comment on their work as follows: 

Karola Ainsar: When I said that I desired to be away, I was already on the road. The field is endless, yet the rain has stopped and colours around me are entirely different than before. The gates take the shape of bridges and I want to know what’s there on the other side. I am already on my way. 

Anaïs Dubois: My purpose in painting is to create a world of my own where everything is possible. This world depicts different spaces like landscape and interior scenes that blend together to create an image. While working with the process of reappropriating my memories I create fragmented and colourful compositions in oil painting that question space and how we perceive it. 

Maria Hindreko: In my painting series I work with the means of collage. The starting point is the repetition of patterns and shapes as well as various contrasts: pink and green; geometric and ambiguous forms; spatiality and flatness; opacity and transparency. I depict these contrasting world with specific transitions characteristic of collages. 

Liisa-Lota Jõeleht: My works are inspired by risograph printing: in order to print photos, colour layers (blue, red, yellow and black) are separated and printed out in layers on top of each other. Small dots of colour blend thus creating new hues. When working on these paintings, I have been contemplating on how much so-called raw information could be included in an image that without any context won’t convey anything and leaving an abstract impression. I compare visuals with fossils where there is a trace of something specific, yet the image/object itself is absent. All we have is the knowledge about its existence. 

Alexander Stanislav Mihheljus: Sometimes you have to face the truth and accept that you don’t always have great ideas swimming around in your head. So, embrace what is given. The hay! 

Daria Morozova: My artwork “Language barrier” addresses the difficulties in expressing one’s emotions and thoughts, as well as the strong desire to communicate with the world either through one’s mother tongue or a foreign language. I often find it difficult to find the right words. I feel that every act of communication is inevietably distorted, words get stuck in your throat, get lost or misinterpreted so that you end up alone with these and your emotions. 

Marc Léger Sauvageot: In the painting series “Wrestle I” and “Wrestle II”, the underlying themes are the power of bodies, their mutual collisions and vulnerability. The artist uses bodies as a starting point to explore sexual identity and psychology while revealing the nuances of sensitivity and subconsious emotions. Various materials such as chalk primer, egg tempera and oil paint. 

Supervisor: Sirja-Liisa Eelma 

Technical support of the exhibition: Mihkel Ilus

Exhibition will be open until December 17, 2023.  

The hall of exhibitions in the library of the University of Tartu (Struve Street 1, Tartu) is open Mon-Fri 9–21, Sat-Sun 12–18. 

On Friday, 17 November at 5:00 p.m. Keiu Maasik will open her solo exhibition “Meadows of Change, a Place Called Home” in the monumental gallery of the Tartu Art House. 

The exhibition is about life in virtual reality and reflects on the possibility that human life may move there in the future. It also deals with the fear that this could happen and what we as humans would lose as a result.

For the past few years, the artist buried herself in the world of computer games and spent as much of her free time as possible in the virtual world. It seemed to be an acceptable thought exercise for her that in the future human life would move to the virtual world. One of the games she immersed herself in for several months was Red Dead Redemption 2. She felt like there was no other place she would rather be than in the world of RDR2. The game takes place in 1899 in America. The story follows the ventures of a gang of outlaws at a time when the Wild West is fading and civilization is encroaching. Their time is coming to an end and fear is in the air ahead of inevitable changes.

“I felt similar fear last year when I encountered a herd of wild horses. A rumble could be heard in the distance, and the ground beneath me shook gently. At some point, about twenty horses came into view, galloping at full speed through sea water. The horses and the powerful scenery seen in the game now seemed hollow in comparison. I want the world to move forward, but I don’t want to lose the galloping horses roaming about freely,” the artist explains.

Keiu Maasik (b. 1992) graduated from the Estonian Academy of Arts with a bachelor’s degree in photography and a master’s degree in contemporary art. In 2019, she received the EKA Young Artist Award. In 2018, she received the Wiiralt scholarship and was the laureate of the competition Young Tartu of the Tartu Art Museum. In her work, she discusses the impact of documentation on memory, identity and relationships between people.

Graphic design: Anna Kaarma

The artist’s gratitude to: Madis Kurss and Kaisa Maasik 

The exhibition is supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

The exhibition is open until 17 December.

• A bus will run from Tallinn to the opening of the exhibition. More information and registration: https://forms.gle/xmanLQ1YxnixyuKv5

www.kunstimaja.ee

facebook.com/kunstimaja

Tartu Art House (Vanemuise 26, Tartu, Estonia) Wed–Mon 12–18. Exhibitions are free of charge.

The exhibitions of the Tartu Art House are supported by the Tartu town government and the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

On Friday, 17 November at 5:00 p.m. Alice Kask and Neeme Külm will open their joint exhibition “Something Righter in This” in the large gallery of the Tartu Art House. 

The exhibition is seemingly a continuation of the show “In Vanity Alone”, which Alice and Neeme organised in the Tallinn City Gallery a year ago. At the same time, it is also not. While the selection at that time was firmly orchestrated by Neeme, who worked as a demiurge transforming the comprehensible space into an incomprehensible one, today the roles have been switched and Alice has reclaimed the space which she had surrendered to Neeme, filling it with her large paintings. Neeme has handed over the reins saying: “Let grace accompany our actions”.

In the gallery, the artists still work independently and on their own, sometimes in a hectic manner, but mostly very self-confidently. Their work, despite differences in their thinking, actions and choices of media, still, miraculously, function together as a strong whole. The powerful symbolism with which they work does not shatter, but increases this unity.

Neeme sows wedges into the walls like budding flowers, replaces the alarm button with pearls for his sweetheart, opens a cello case like a confession and fills an archaic confessional with texts from his journal. Hidden behind the declarations of love and the hints of reconciliation, he also gently establishes himself and keeps a watchful eye over the whole space. The gaze is casual but still present, because somebody has to gaze.

The unmistakable Alice, who only dares to speak about herself, transforms her paintings into the attributes of femininity, concentrating on a lone figure, on a single item, but full of tension and on a grandiose scale. Ruthlessly precise in what she is trying to show, straightforward in concealing what deserves to be hidden. Only nature is left outside Alice’s penetrating gaze: she looks at it from a distance and sees it as something bigger than herself. The dark and dreary elements can only be captured vaguely, recorded only from a distance. So complicated and, at the same time, also so simple. As sincere as possible.

“A certain uncompromising discomfort for the inevitable corporeality of human consciousness” is present in the “striking spatial-poetic ping-pong” which accompanies the exhibition of Alice Kask and Neeme Külm. These were the words of the art critic Hanno Soans a year ago and, lo and behold, they indeed still hold true.

Alice Kask (b. 1976) graduated in 2002 from the master’s programme in painting of the Estonian Academy of Arts. Since her major solo exhibition at the Contemporary Art Museum of Estonian (2016), she has recently shown her works at the Helsinki Art Hall (2018) and Rüki Gallery (2020). In 2008, she had a solo exhibition in the Tartu Art Museum. Among other accolades, in 2003 she received the Konrad Mägi Award.

Neeme Külm (b. 1974) graduated in 1998 from the Department of Sculpture of the Estonian Academy of Arts and studied in 2003–2005 in the master’s programme of interdisciplinary arts at the same school. His most powerful solo exhibitions took place in the first half of the 2010s and his more recent group shows have existed on the border between architecture and visual arts. Külm was one of the founders of the Contemporary Art Museum of Estonia.

The artists thank: Tamara Luuk, Kadri Villand, Johann Tanel Möldre, Lepo Külm, Berit Teeäär, Tiit Talvaru, Hilkka Hiiop and Päär Keedus.

The exhibition is supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

The exhibition is open until 17 December.

*A bus will run from Tallinn to the opening of the exhibition. More information and registration here: https://forms.gle/xmanLQ1YxnixyuKv5

www.kunstimaja.ee

facebook.com/kunstimaja

Tartu Art House (Vanemuise 26, Tartu, Estonia) Wed–Mon 12–18. Exhibitions are free of charge.

The exhibitions of the Tartu Art House are supported by the Tartu town government and the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

Artists: Aili Vint (EE), Daria Melnikova (LV), Kristel Saan (EE), Kristina Õllek (EE), Monika Varšavskaja (EE/FR), Morta Jonynaitė (LT), Viktorija Daniliauskaitė (LT)

Curator: Merilin Talumaa (EE)

The exhibition Breathing Through the Eyes at L’Atlas in Paris gathers together different generations of artists from the Baltic countries, most of them presenting their work in Paris for the first time.

The exhibition touches subtly on the ideas of Lithuanian-American archaeologist and anthropologist Marija Gimbutas, whose profound research brought attention to the ancient cultures of the Baltic region and the broader Indo-European world, especially well described in her book The Balts (1963). The exhibition takes its inspiration from Gimbutas’ ideas which have influenced contemporary perspectives on heritage, indigenous identities, and the relationship between humans and nature in the Baltic Sea area.

Research on the cross-disciplines of archaeological artefacts, linguistics, ethnography and folklore led Gimbutas to posit the thesis that prehistoric European culture was female-centred and worshipped a Mother Goddess as the giver of all life. The Goddess’ power was in water and stone, in cave and tomb, in animals and birds, in hills, trees and flowers. A spiritual sense of connectedness was artfully expressed through a sophisticated symbol system and an abundance of ritual objects. Nature and body (especially the female body) were honoured in Europe for tens of thousands of years. Women had an especially strong position in societies across Eastern and Central Europe – a tendency no longer necessarily evident today.

The exhibition Breathing through the eyes poetically comments on the fragile materiality of our being, multiple identities, the process of change and new environmental sensibility. Gimbutas, who having opened the treasure trove of prehistory, inspired a belief in a peaceful existence in our time – to bring back to life suppressed vital elements, such as the earth, the body (health), the feminine, and the subconscious. Participating artists, through imaginative and fictitious narratives, share personal stories and beliefs that also reflect the influence of Gimbutas’ theories on ancient symbolism. Their works echo these concepts through a contemporary lens, incorporating elements such as spirals, circles, and motifs such as snakes and birds – symbols rooted in ancient European matriarchal cultures that continue to resonate in Baltic art and culture.

The exhibition directs us to consider how we might reimagine a world centred around goddess worship, with its emphasis on preserving nature, nurturing existence, and forsaking warfare. Could this theoretical concept transcend into the tangible reality of our future society? Breathing through the eyes seamlessly intertwines historical narratives, cultural myths, and potential scenarios, immersing us in the themes that Marija Gimbutas ignited: the celebration of life’s cycles, the sanctity of the female body and labour, and the spirituality inherent in these concepts. Gimbutas’ exploration of the spiritual dimensions of a harmonious Old Europe and her vision for a New Europe free from dominance and warfare feels remarkably pertinent in our contemporary world.

Gastronomic performance: Monika Varšavskaja (EE/FR)

Exhibition setup: Daria Melnikova (LV)

Communication visuals: Gaile Pranckunaite (LT)

Exhibition stays open until December 22, 2023.

L’Atlas
4 Cour de l’île Louviers, 75004 Paris

Opening hours: Tuesday—Saturday, 12pm—7pm

Free entrance

Marija Gimbutas (1921–1994) was a Lithuanian-American archaeologist and anthropologist. She contributed to what is considered to be one of the most significant academic watershed moments in women’s studies with her archaeological and philosophical work on Neolithic culture and religion. Gimbutas is best known for her research into the Neolithic and Bronze Age cultures of “Old Europe,” a term she introduced. Old Europe referred to both the geographical area and social structures that existed before the Indo-European influence. Gimbutas unequivocally established the existence of a Goddess religion who is the most persistent feature in the archaeological record of the ancient world. The Goddess in all her manifestations was a symbol of the unity of all life in nature. ​​Gimbutas’ discoveries took on great symbolic importance for feminists across various disciplines who found, in her vision of a peaceful, nature-revering society, a sense of hope for the future based on this foundation in the distant past.

“The Art of Adapting” opening on Thursday, 14 September at 6.30 pm

Artists: Sophie Durand, Elo-Reet Järv, Sandra Kosorotova, Kärt Ojavee, Uku Sepsivart, Denisa Štefanigová, Paco Ulman, Kristina Õllek

At the opening, at 7.30 pm, Johhan Rosenberg will present his site-specific performance “Adapting to 360°”. Rosenberg’s sculptural performance is rooted in the core of a myth. Before the audience’s eyes, the legends of Ovid’s Metamorphoses from the Kadriorg Palace ceiling painting will come to life.

The exhibition observes the approaches of contemporary artists to nature appreciation and the de-aestheticising of nature, rooted in ecological aesthetics and ecofeminism. The exhibition displays works by critical contemporary artists and works from the collections of the Art Museum of Estonia. 

Curators: Madli Ehasalu, Triin Metsla
Exhibition designer: Siim Karro 
Graphic designer: Tuuli Aule
Coordinators: Kerttu Männiste, Aleksandra Murre, Laura Tahk
Educational programmes: Ilona Kroon, Eneli Raal, Berta Vahtra

The exhibition will remain open until 3 March 2024. 

Within the framework of the Open Lectures Series of the Department of Architecture and Urban Design of EKA, Birgitte Svarre will take the stage in the hall of EKA on 30th November at 6:15 pm with lecture “Public space / public life – an interaction – how to study and make room for it.” She talks about her work studying public life and creating space for it.

The lecture is preceded by public presentation of the book “How to Study Public Life” at 5:30 pm in EKA lobby.

Birgitte Svarre is the co-author of the book “How to Study Public Life”. She has a MA on Modern Culture, a PhD in Architecture and is CEO at BARK, Copenhagen, a consultancy focused on strategic development of places with a focus on both people and places. BARK is owned by the Building Heritage Foundation. Until 2022, Birgitte Svarre has been with Gehl Architects for more than 14 years consulting cities mainly in Northern Europe on human centered planning, public space and public life, including as head of Gehl’s Cities team. She is currently part of the advisory board for lively city centers for the Danish Foundation Realdania.

Architect Jan Gehl is an Adjunct Professor at the Aarhus School of Architecture, Professor (ret.) of Urban Design, The Royal Danish Academy and Founding Partner, Gehl Architects. In 1971 Jan Gehl published the seminal book Life Between Buildings launching a whole new thinking about the design and development of cities. Gehl’s first book and subsequent publications sparked a showdown with the car-centric cities and began mapping and describing people-friendly interventions in the infrastructure of cities. His books include Life Between Buildings, Public Spaces – Public Life, New City Spaces, New City Life, Cities for People.

The open lectures are intended for students and professionals of all disciplines, not just the field of architecture. All lectures take place in the large auditorium of EKA, are in English, free of charge and open to all interested parties. Be there!

Within the framework of a series of open lectures, the Department of Architecture and Urban Design of EKA brings to the audience in Tallinn every academic year about a dozen unique practitioners and valued theoreticians of the field. You can watch previous lectures from www.avatudloengud.ee

The lecture series is supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

On December 4, EKA Urban Studies students will present the zine “The Cheapest Option”.

Urban Studies students Elena Pusčiūtė, Ishrat Shaheen, Jonas Vyšniauskas, Maria Laura Benduzu Ulluo, Kalina Trajanovska and Kush Badhwar in collaboration with EKA GD students Joao Nogueira and Karthik Palepu release The Cheapest Option, a zine emerging from the semester-long studio Production of Urban Space, guided by Helen Runting and Leonard Ma.

The zine explores how ideas of the non-plan, neoliberalism, markets, cybernetics, and neo-liberal subjects shape our experience of space, explored through forms including city postcards, generic characters, local newspapers, and memes.

In autumn 2023, the open architectural lectures will take place under the title Mobile Masters. The theme brings architects and theorists to Tallinn, who analyse architecture’s flexibility and the mobile practices of architects, spatial designers and artists.

Gregor Taul, the curator of the autumn lectures, introduces the program with the following words: “Architecture stands at a significant crossroads. Ten-year-old buildings are demolished and taken to the landfill. The lifespan of an interior design project is five years at best, if that. These bleak facts do not inspire confidence in a discipline that requires so many resources in light of such a short time perspective. What does ‘better not do anything’ mean for spatial design? What might ‘mobile architecture’ refer to or who is a ‘mobile designer’? How can moving people or things be a positive spatial practice?”

On December 7, Brussels-based Laurens Bekemans and co-founder of Brussels-based BC architects & studies, will be on the EKA main hall stage in Tallinn with the lecture The Act of Building.

BC is BC architects, studies and materials. BC stands for Brussels Cooperation and points to how BC grew – embedded within place and people. Started in 2012 as a hybrid office, BC is manoeuvring the boundaries of architecture in a doers manner. With three different legal entities, the team engages in a variety of experimental projects through which it designs bioregional and circular architecture, researches educational and construction processes and produces new building materials using local waste streams such as excavated earth

Laurens introduces his lecture in the following words:

From the first fieldtrips for the design of a library in Burundi to involving over 150 workshop participants in the construction of a public building in Belgium, these stories tell how BC engages in acts of building. The act of building is act and discourse.It is the complex effort of a temporary association to create an infrastructure of its own. In order to have a positive impact on our society, BC believes that architects need to intervene beyond the narrow definition of the professional who designs and controls the execution of buildings. 

Hence, BC ventures into material production, contracting, storytelling, knowledge transfer, community organization, which all influence BC’s design approach. The act of building has an impact and is at the same time a manifestation of values and ideas, which grew out of a broad network around a specific project. Building has a transformative power, driven by action, narrative and result. The lecture will guide you through key moments and key projects, which helped transform BC into the hybrid practice it is today. 

*

The open lectures are intended for students and professionals of all disciplines, not just the field of architecture. All lectures take place in the large auditorium of EKA, are in English, free of charge and open to all interested parties. Be there!

Within the framework of a series of open lectures, the Department of Architecture and Urban Design of EKA brings to the audience in Tallinn every academic year about a dozen unique practitioners and valued theoreticians of the field. You can watch lectures from previous years on YouTube or www.avatudloengud.ee

The lecture series is supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

Curator: Gregor Taul

On 14 December Britta Benno, a PhD candidate of the Estonian Academy of Arts, curriculum of Art and Design, will defend her thesis “Thinking in Layers, Worlding in Layers: Posthuman Landscapes in Expanded Field of Printmaking and Drawing” (“Mõtlemine kihtides, kujutlemine kihtides. Posthumanistlikud maastikud laiendatud joonistus- ja graafikaväljal”).

Public defence will be held on 14th of December 2023 at 15.00 at EKA (Põhja pst 7), room A501.

Supervisor: Dr. Elnara Taidre

External reviewers: Dr. Elo-Hanna Seljamaa (University of Tartu), Prof. Linda Kaljundi (Estonian Academy of Arts).
Opponent: Dr. Elo-Hanna Seljamaa

The defense will be held in Estonian.

The goal of my creative research “Thinking in Layers, Worlding in Layers: Posthuman Landscapes in Expanded Field of Printmaking and Drawing” is, first of all, to search for new art forms; to develop the fields of drawing and printmaking – by embracing the expansion of their vocabulary, exhaustively describing the work methods and conceptualising various activities.
Printmaking is doing very well today, especially due to the vast possibilities of such expansions and working methods, in all kinds of forms and concepts, whether as a posthumanist or nostalgic resistance. What is needed in my opinion, however, is a broader and more meaningful interpretation and opening up of the exact printing technologies chosen, not only the technical accomplishment – one could even say that there is a demand for a revelation of inherent tacit knowledge. I find this openness to be conceptually very characteristic of drawing. I can place all of my creative activity under the expanded drawing field, because everything starts with a simple drawing and continues depending on the conceptual and formal decisions in subsequent layers of materials and art media. The openness, permeability and permissiveness of drawing has been an essential part of all my creative research, on top of which the following layers of media, thoughts and materials have grown: animation, installation, etc.
This research is based on my three solo exhibitions – “Dystopic Tallinn” (Tallinn Art Hall Gallery, 2019), “Ruinenlust: Lasnamägi” (Hobusepea Gallery, 2020) and “Of Becoming a Land(Scape)” (Tartu Art House, 2022) – on the discussions that accompanied the creation of their concepts and artworks, exemplifying my approach to layered thinking and worlding, and to the expanded media in different variations. The thesis could be read as a travelogue in the layers of the concepts of the exhibited works.
The creative research allows me to conclude that the expanded fields of printmaking and drawing are areas full of potential, which function as subjects and methods of creative research, when used in tandem with other media – either as independent art forms, or together, as a hybrid. My exhibition practice demonstrates that prints and drawings are able to relate to new discourses and address current issues. These processes provide for endless techniques and qualities to constantly explore and disassemble.
More broadly, the dissertation contributes to the internal observation and treatment of creative processes from the artist’s position.The written part is primarily intended for other artists to conceptualise and discuss their own creative processes, including in processes of teaching and learning.

The thesis is available HERE.

Members of the Defence Committee: dr Jaana Päeva (Head of the Committee), Dr. Anu Allas, Prof. Kirke Kangro, Dr. Kärt Ojavee, Dr. Liina Unt, Dr. Kristina Jõekalda, Prof. Indrek Ibrus.

You are invited to the opening of the exhibition LET’S GET PHYGITAL and a guest talk, where the organisers Anneleen Swillen, Mala Siamptani and Darja Popolitova will discuss contemporary jewellery practices through the prism of digital technologies.

The exhibition opening and a guest talk is on the 30th of November, 17:00–18:30.

The exhibition is open from 30.11 to 18.12.2023.

If you can’t join IRL, sign up for a Zoom guest talk via this link

Meeting ID: 912 0263 6427
Passcode: 202810
Topic: Let’s Get Phygital vestlusõhtu
Time: Nov 30, 2023 05:00 PM Helsinki 

Exhibition Information:

LET’S GET PHYGITAL is a students’ exhibition celebrating the 3rd edition of a collaborative project between the jewellery departments of the London College of Fashion (LCF), the Estonian Academy of Arts (EKA) and the PXL-MAD School Of Arts.

The exhibition acknowledges how digital experiences advance artistic thinking and practice by creating an IRL space for digital adornment. By using Augmented Reality filters as tools, the students investigated how contemporary adornment can exist in non-physical forms, be wearable and interact with their audience.

Information About Speakers:

• Anneleen Swillen is a postdoctoral researcher and tutor at PXL-MAD School of Arts Hasselt and Hasselt University, located in Belgium. She explores jewellery in a phygital culture through research in the arts, education, curation, and writing. In 2020, she co-founded Artificial Intelligems in collaboration with composer Greg Scheirlinckx. As a fluid and interdisciplinary collective, currently working on the intersection of jewellery, graphic design, music, XR-performance, dance, and data science, they aim to explore more-than-human co-creation.
• Mala Siamptani is a design practitioner with substantial experience in the research, development and delivery of creative projects in Fashion, Design and Art sector. After obtaining two Masters degrees and currently conducting a PhD research, Mala runs her studio in east London specializing in the design and manufacture of products and sculptural objects. Mala has designed and manufactured jewellery and object collections which have been exhibited in Cyprus, Greece, Spain, Italy, Australia, Germany and the UK. Following extensive material research, Mala’s work attempts to connect traditional craft with digital technology. She has recently presented her research projects at the Global fashion Conference (Leon), the Creativity Researchers Conference (UK) and the 1st World Symposium for Fashion, Jewellery and Accessories (Shanghai). Through her design work and research, Mala demonstrates both the use and need for material research and its acknowledgment of experiential knowledge to advance craft thinking and practice.
• Darja Popolitova is a contemporary jewellery artist, curator, lecturer and PhD student at the Estonian Academy of Arts; born in 1989 in Sillamäe and based in Tallinn. An ironical view of nowadays drives her process, which fuels her to blend digital craft and video performances with fiction. She finds jewellery’s haptic and symbolic nature a generous medium that allows her to conceptualise ideas. For her artistic practice, she was honoured with numerous awards and scholarships such as Annual Award of Estonian Cultural Endowment (2020), the EAA Research Publication Award (2020), Adamson-Eric Scholarship (2018) and the Artist Laureate Salary (2022). She took part in the shows at the Smack Mellon Gallery in New York (2022), the Arnhem Museum in the Netherlands (2020) and the Museum of Arts and Design in New York (2019).

On 19 December Arife Dila Demir, a PhD candidate of the Estonian Academy of Arts, curriculum of Art and Design, will defend her practice-based thesis “Extended [Textile] Soma: Somaesthetics of Bodily Discomforts” („(Tekstiilist) laiendatud soma: kehalise ebamugavuse somaesteetika“).

Public defence will be held on 19th of December 2023 at 11.00 at EKA (Põhja pst 7), room A501.

Supervisors: Prof. Nithikul Nimkulrat (OCAD University), Dr. Kristi Kuusk (Estonian Academy of Arts)
External reviewers: Prof. Kristina Höök (KTH Royal Institute of Technology), Dr. Vasiliki Tsaknaki (IT University of Copenhagen)
Opponent: Dr. Claudia Núñez-Pacheco (Umeå University)

Human existence in the world is an embodied one; it is through our moving and sensing bodies – our somas – that we live and be in the world. Our somas, through the sensory capacities, are in constant engagement with internal and external stimuli that shape our understanding of our environment and ourselves. These stimuli may appear as pleasant or discomforting or beyond. For some unfortunate ones, internal discomforting sensations become persistent inhabitants of their bodies defining their embodied existence. This dissertation refers to these persistent discomforting events ‘bodily discomfort’ that disrupt the everyday flow of the body such as migraine, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome, depression, chronic pain, etc.
Extended [Textile] Soma: Somaesthetics of Bodily Discomforts specifically focuses on chronic musculoskeletal pain acknowledging the hardship of removal of this phenomenon. It discusses that such a phenomenon requires a more-than-symptom-relieving approach that focuses on enhancing the lived experience of bodily discomfort. Thus, it focuses on supporting transformative becomings with our bodies in discomfort to learn new ways of living and being that is the somaesthetics of bodily discomforts.
Respectively, the main research question of this practice-based dissertation is: how may movement-based interactive textile wearables as soma extensions be designed to facilitate somaesthetic awareness of chronic musculoskeletal pain? In other words, this dissertation explores the ways of designing with/for/through discomfort aiming to facilitate somaesthetics awareness through breaking the habitual ways of engaging with discomfort. It uses soma extensions that mediate movement-based interactions and externalize the felt qualities of chronic pain to provide unhabitual engagements of it. The main research question is explored through three creative case studies that provide methodological and theoretical insights on how to design with/for/through discomfort and form the design program called designing with discomfort.
Designing with discomfort is the main contribution of this dissertation which is exemplified by three case studies. In offering this design programme, this dissertation calls on designer researchers to imagine other ways of being with discomforting experiences and provide a space to closely engage with such sensations to become anew.

The thesis is available HERE.

Members of the Defence Committee: dr Jaana Päeva (Head of the Committee), Dr. Anu Allas, Prof. Kirke Kangro, Dr. Kärt Ojavee, Dr. Liina Unt, Dr. Kristina Jõekalda, Prof. Danielle Wilde, Prof. Indrek Ibrus.

Open Mon-Sat at 15.00-18.00

December brings an opportunity to experience, in an exhibition format, works produced by students in the Faculty of Fine Arts as their term projects: every day there will be a fresh crop of university students’ works on display in the gallery.

Works in contemporary art, prints, installation, sculpture and painting curricula will be on display. On each morning of the marathon, a new exhibition will be installed and in the evening the exhibit will give way to the next one. Hopefully, viewers will be able to keep up with the pace of the young artists.

SCHEDULE

01—02.12 Scenography, supervisor Mark Raidpere

04.12 Photography, supervisor Paul Kuimet

05.12 Drawing, supervisor Eero Alev

06.12 Painting, supervisors Tõnis Saadoja, Karl-Kristjan Nagel

07.12 Painting, supervisors Tõnis Saadoja, Anna Škodenko

08.12 Sculpture, supervisor Taavi Talve, Laura Põld

09.12 Drawing, supervisor Britta Benno

11.12 Graphic Art, supervisors Liina Siib, Katrin Kaev, Viktor Gurov, Caroline Pajusaar, Taavi Suisalu

12.12 Graphic Art, supervisors Kadi Kurema, Mark Antonius Puhkan, Charlotte Biszewski, Eve Kaaret

13.12 Scenography, supervisor Tomo Stanič

14—15.12 Contemporary Art, supervisors Charlotte Emma Biszewski, Paul Kuimet, Camille Antoine Laurelli, Holger Loodus, Laura Põld, David Ross, Taavi Talve, Jaan Toomik, Anu Vahtra, Reimo Võsa-Tangsoo

16.12 Painting, supervisors Sirja-Liisa Eelma, Vladimir Dubossarsky, Mart Vainre

18—19.12 Contemporary Art, supervisors Charlotte Emma Biszewski, Sirja-Liisa Eelma, Maris Karjatse, Camille Antoine Laurelli, Laura Põld, David Ross, Sten Saarits, Liina Siib, Taavi Talve, Jaan Toomik, Anu Vahtra

20.12 Photography, supervisor Anna Mari Liivrand

On 21 December Mariann Raisma, a PhD candidate at Estonian Academy of Arts, curriculum of Cultural Heritage and Conservation, will defend the thesis „The Power of the Museum. Shaping Collective Memory in Estonia during the Turning Points of the 20th Century“ („Muuseumi võim. Muuseum kollektiivse mälu kujundajana Eestis 20. sajandi murranguperioodidel“).

Public defence will be held on 21st of December 2023 at 11.00 at EKA (Põhja pst 7), room A101.

Supervisors: Prof. Linda Kaljundi (Estonian Academy of Arts), Dr. Anneli Randla (Estonian Academy of Arts)

External reviewers: Dr. Anu Kannike (Estonian National Museum), Dr. Marleen Metslaid (Estonian National Museum)

Opponent: Dr. Anu Kannike (Estonian National Museum)

The defense will be held in Estonian.

Over the past two centuries, museums have played a pivotal role in shaping societies’ understanding of the past. They guide our perceptions of history, determine the delicate balance between forgetting and remembering, and influence the hierarchy of values associated with heritage.

This dissertation critically examines the power and influence of museums as mediums of cultural memory, with a focus on the Estonian museum field. Given that our identity is intricately tied to what we remember and what we choose to forget, it is crucial to understand the reasons and processes behind the shaping and shifting of collective memory throughout historical periods. This research focuses on the history of the Estonian museum in the 20th century, examining three periods which saw significant historical turning points: 1919–1925, 1940–1941/1944–1953 and 1987–1994.

The history of Estonian museums offers insights into how the core principles, values and canons for constructing cultural memory changed during these periods of social and political upheaval. These changes encompassed the nature and interpretation of ideologies, themes and how they were represented, museums as institutions, their hierarchy and nomenclature, the dynamics of the relationship between power and the institution, and the capacity, intent and ability of museums to shape society’s collective memory.

The identity and institutions of the Estonian museum field underwent significant changes throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. Beginning with self-definition rooted in European culture, museums transitioned to embracing ‘Heimat’ before evolving to value ethnicity. This evolution culminated in ideas for large national museums, which eventually diversified into various specialised museums during the 20th century. The regional discourse of the early 20th century gave way to a national narrative, followed by a Soviet-Marxist perspective. In the final decade of the century, national cultural memory underwent a revival. This sequence of ideas was also reflected in history-themed permanent exhibitions: the 1920s witnessed the legitimisation of popular culture as elite; the 1940s established a normative approach to historical materialism; and from the late 1980s, nationalism triumphed once again, ushering in new museological approaches. While analysing all these changes, this dissertation emphasises the hybridity of Estonian museum history and its interweaving with different cultural spaces and paradigms.

Throughout the three periods of upheaval discussed, museums were at the forefront of the shaping of a new cultural memory canon. Correspondingly, these turning points have contributed to the formation of Estonia’s own unique museum field.

The thesis is available HERE.

Members of the Defence Committee: Prof. Hilkka Hiiop (Head of the Committee), Dr. Anu Allas, Prof. Krista Kodres, Prof. Juhan Maiste, Prof. Kurmo Konsa