Streetart in Pärnu

Streetart in Pärnu
Summer 2013
Streetart found in the streets of Pärnu before the Sõnum Seinal streetart festival


Skateboard jump


Estonia is great!


This one makes me wonder who came first, the Minnie or the bikinibabe


Rise up crew - Those who understand philosophy, psychology and art do not need religion


Sick ideas - sick deeds

Man & Woman: Sacred?

Man & Woman: Sacred?
Pärnu Museum of New Art, Estonia
12.6.-1.9.13
The annual exhibition on the topics of sex, the sexes, and the difference of the sexes

This is an exhibition you should never miss in Estonia. Every year the Pärnu Museum of New Art is dealing with the endless topics and connotations related to the sexes, sex and the differences between the sexes, and at the same time showing the wide variety of contemporary artists from the Baltic region. This year the exhibition contain a puppet/sculpture department, a few videos, various work by Enn Põldroos, and new works by established Estonian artists, in addition to the wide variety of works by artists from the Baltic countries, Poland and Finland. As always there are some really impressive works, some pleasingly surprising ones, and some slightly provoking art. Here are my subjective selection of highlights:


Exhibition view


Tatjana Martinova (LV): Awakeing


Olga Gudis (LV): Still Boy



A nice sculpture as it is, but hilarious if you know about this childrens' cartoon about the big bear and the little girl.


Elina Brotherus (FI): Serial of photos - Artist at work

A wonderful series of selfportraits with artists as accessories. At first it seems like a series showing a model entering the studio, modelling for painters, and the final paintings. But the thin wire from her hand reveals that she is actually the artist composing the picture. The artists become puppets in her game, she is the one photographing and the painters are her models


Jan Smagu & Aneta Grzeszykowska (PL): Headache

The most fantastic depiction of a terrible headache. Have you ever felt like the head is tossed around by its own body, having no possibility to end the pain? In this video the body parts actually separates and collaborate in harassing the head, kicking it like a ball or tossing it around.


Viggo Wallensköld (FI): Ruler


Jüri Arrak: Temptations of Saint Anthony


Kalev Mark Kostabi: Wistful Thinking


Artwork by Enn Põldroos

Nuart 2013

Nuart 2013

MARTHA COOPER (US), DAL EAST (CN), ROA (BE), M-CITY (PL), FAITH47 (ZA), HUSH (UK), VHILS (PT), ERNEST ZACHAREVIC (LT), C215 (FR), DOT DOT DOT (NO), DOTMASTER (UK), STRØK (NO), MARTIN WHATSON (NO), DAVID CHOE (US) AIKO (JP)

7.9.-20.1013

Stavanger, Norway

Streetart festival

The annual streetart highlight is about to begin, the first artists are already at the spot. This is going to be larger than ever, and I am seriously worrying about how to be able to see it all. There sure are a lot of treats coming up. 

Just mark the date 7.9. and look out for surprises in Stavanger!

www.nuartfestival.no

Erik Sæter Jørgensen: All Watched Over

All Watched Over
Erik Sæter Jørgensen
10.8.-7.9.13
Reed Projects Gallery, Stavanger
Photo documentation/installation

What do you want to see on the public walls in your hometown? Commercial posters, NGO slogans, graffiti or just blank walls? Erik Sæter Jørgensen presents some of the options. Usually the choice is not made by you, it is something you just need to accept, but in this exhibition the artist is the curator of the walls.

We get the giant shining letters of a candy shop, numerous walls decorated by the local graffiti writers Rebel and Mask, a giant banner promoting vegan lifestyle, ads for a pornmovie shop, some random blank wall, and a silver buff (silver is the most effective color to cover what is underneath, well known by both graffiti writers and the companies painting over it (buffing the tags)).



It is obvious what is Erik Sæter Jørgensen’s choice. He has apparently spent most time making the giant banner promoting veganism and straight edge lifestyle. And the number of photos documenting walls improved by Rebel and Mask truly dominate these gallery walls.

 

Also I would prefer colorful walls made by local artists over ugly commercials by dubious companies. But then again, what would I prefer between a badly made tag and some smart commercials for a product I like? It really does not matter, I am not the one to choose what will be on the walls. But I am able to appreciate what I like and pretending to ignore what I do not like.  

Yngve Holen: Extended Operations

Extended Operations
Yngve Holen
15.8.-13.10.13
Rogaland Kunstsenter, Stavanger
Installations

Measuring the range of airplanes, 3D-printing, transforming shapes into marble. The incredible possibilities of contemporary technology make the background of this exhibition.

What I see are chunks of meat made in marble, placed on airplane aisles, lifted up on what appears to be massage benches, and oversized 3D-printouts of distorted smart phones.



These strike me as monuments to our sudden, immense wealth. What happens when a culture shifts from poor to rich? You start eating expensive food like meat (or even follow intricate diets eating only meat), shopping body treatments, travelling to exotic places, buying the latest technology stuff like smartphones. And then there is the catalogue. A slick, flashy magazine containing texts about flying and instagram pictures of travel, some showing the luxury of business class, others showing the chaos after a serious turbulence, but all with one major purpose: to tell the world (on the web) that you are travelling, either in luxury or on an adventure. This is the story of our generation, suddenly realizing we can buy almost all we wish for.

Is this a criticism of our consumer lifestyle? Or rather a celebration of it?  Marble sculptures were used to depict important persons or events, here the use of expensive marble and 3D-printing to depict something ordinary might symbolise the meaninglessness of our wealth.



What about the amount of sculptures? Each smartphonesculpture is unique, but the marblemeatpieces appear as identical. Only the position of their pedestals/massagebenches/airplanaisles are different. Why produce several identical sculptures when one would really be enough? Why have 3 cars when you can only drive one at the time, why have two cottages when you can only stay in one at the time? Because you can do it.

Edith Karlson: Drama is in your head III

Drama is in your head III
Edith Karlson
17.7.-5.8.13
Hobusepea galerii, Tallinn
Installation/sculpture

This is an artist that obviously has fun while sculpting, going wild with dinosaurs, monsters, blood and garbage. The whole floor of the gallery basement is temporarily covered in plaster as base for the bag monster and its bag eggs(?), and the giant dinosaur constantly spewing blood into an oil tin. You might think you are sneaking in on the dinosaur, but all the time it is watching you through the mirror.

In an interview the artist dreams about getting a formal comission from the city, then she would make a sculpture of a riding mayor and his army, riding on dinosaurs. I know several existing sculptures in the city that I would love to be exchanged with this vision by Karlson.

Art Allmägi: Back to Paradise

Back to Paradise
Art Allmägi
20.7.-11.8.13
Linnagalerii, Tallinn
Allegoric installations

An impressive installation mixing impressions from different parts of art history, mixing images of Adam&Eve and Snowwhite, secret garden, exclusion and greed.

Ado Lill: Nude

Nude
Ado Lill
25.7.-18.8.13
Kunstihoone galerii, Tallinn
Nude paintings in striking colors

Vabaduse Püüe (Freedom attempt)

Vabaduse Püüe (Freedom attempt)
Various artists
Viljandi Uue Kunsti Muuseumis
10.7.-20.8.13
Various attempts to describe freedom

This year I was slightly disappointed to discover that the always interesting exhibition series "Man & Woman" was not at both Pärnu New Art Museum and Viljandi Art Museum, only at the first one. But then I was relieved to discover still another exhibition in Viljandi, still more or less dealing with the same topics. In fact, the exhibition was spread out in different rooms in the old school building. Here are some of the highlights:
Silva Eher: Nagu midagi poleks (Like something wasn't)


Silva Eher: Helgeid Mõtteid (Bright thoughts)

*

Aleksander Pushkin (BLR): Vilnius, Saratseenlanna (Vilnius, Saraceness)


Aleksander Pushkin: Pushkin kuulab Shaljapinit + Mina, tuuleveskitega võitleja (Pushkin listens to Shaljapin + Me, the fighter of windmills)


Viktor Dashuk: documentary "Selfportrait with handcuffs"

A very interesting documentary about a unique artist, a Belarussian Don Quixote fighting against the authorities. For us it is comic when the police enter a nationalist meeting claiming there is a bomb threat and everybody need to leave the building, even if all know this is a lie. And it is touching to see how he puts up his tripod every year at the independence day to paint one day a year on his large painting, always harassed by the local authorities.

*

Kuulo Vahter


Kuulo Vahter: 22 Eestit (22 Estonias)


Kuulo Vahter: 22 Eestit (22 Estonias)

Estonian streetart

Estonian streetart
in Tallinn, Viljandi and Kasepää
Summer 2013

* Tallinn *




MinajaLydia


Edward von Lõngus


Edward von Lõngus


Edward von Lõngus



* Viljandi *





* Kasepää *

Side Effects

Side Effects
22 artists
Contemporary Art Museum of Estonia (EKKM), Tallinn
23.6.-28.7.13
Group exhibition

Entering a group exhibition at EKKM is like entering a new city, you never know what appears around the next corner. It might be something wonderful, but it may also be totally ordinary. The ordinary and the everyday routine is the theme of this exhibition. Everyday objects put into new use, ordinary scenes in a new setting. This is the kind of exhibition that has me noticing the objects around me, wondering how they could be used in artwork, or considering their artistic values as they are. Here are some highlights:


David Evrard & Jaro Straub: South Monument for a Douk Douk

The elements for the sculpture is sent in a box per mail, and the reciever must try to construct the sculpture. Each time the sculpture is repacked, an extra item is added.


Ivars Gravlejs: Shopping Poetry

Shopping receipts and a photo of the objects shopped.


Julien Prévieux: Drawing Workshop, Anti Criminalty Squad, 14th district, Paris

Intricate maps of criminal incidents in one district in Paris.


David Evrard: Pizza

Drawings of Pizzas.


Serge Comte: Chinese

Portraits of unknown Chinese found on the web, reconstructed in plastic beads.


Stéphane Déplan: Post it

17 Post-it notes with the same message: "I had a good idea, but somebody else had the same" - on the stairs between the exhibition floors.


Serge Comte: Colored Millimetres

Minute drawings millimeter by millimeter, square by square. What it turns out to be is less important than the process.


Alexandra Galkina: Frottages

Frottages of various monuments in Estonia.


Camille Laurelli: Riot

A horde of miniature clay figures all seemingly quite upset by something.


Alexandra Galkina: A Dynamic Construction

So easy, so wonderful.


Marko Mäetamm: 10 Last Days

A movie about the artist's nightmare: an exhibition venue allowing almost nothing, having no ideas, and limited time. The light drawings give a humoristic insight to the artists's world.