Category: Departments

Exhibition of jewellery and blacksmithing students at the Biennial of Contemporary Jewellery in Lisbon includes EKA students Erle Nemvalts, Taavi Teevet, Terje Meisterson, Isimini Pachi, Tauris Reose, Mirjam Aun and Kristiina Tang on 17.–20. September 2021 at Ar.Co – Centro de Arte e Comunicação Visual, at the first Lisbon Contemporary Jewelery Biennale SUOR FRIO / COLD SWEAT

The challenge was presented to 8 European schools with different approaches to contemporary jewellery, with the aim of creating dialogues between young participants. The exhibition, as well as the biennial more generally, invites to reflect on three contemporary keywords – body, fear and protection, the latter of which refers to the characteristic historical aspect of jewellery as a means of protection for the wearer.

Participating schools are: Ar.Co – Centro de Arte e Comunicação Visual, Burg Giebichenstein– Hochschule für Kunst und Design Halle (DE), Central of Saint Martins – University of the Arts (UK), École Nationale Supérieur d’Árts de Limoge (F), Eesti Kunstiakadeemia (EE), Lucerne School of Art and Design (CH), PXL-MAD School of Arts Media Arts Design (B) and Saint Lucas School of Arts Antwerpen (B).

September 16–November 20, 2021 – exhibitions, colloquium, master classes

Training School Local Stories and Visual Narratives for international PhD students will take place on September 15th – 17th in Estonian Academy of Arts.

The action proposes an innovative investigation and implementation of a process for developing human understanding of communities, their society, and their situatedness by narrative methods. It particularly focuses on the potential of narrative methods for urban development in European medium-sized cities.

Mark Gottdiener’s public lecture “Postmodern semiotics” will take place on 15th September as part of the Training School seminar “Local Stories and Visual Narratives”.
The lecture will take place at 18.00–20.00 via Zoom and is open to the public in the lobby (A101).

Mark Gottdiener (b 1943) is a professor of sociology at University at Buffalo, specializing in urban sociology. He is called one of the most important Urban Sociologist in U.S.

The Training School in EKA will focus on local urban stories, taking the city of Tallinn as an example. Participants will engage in site visits, analysis workshops, discussions and lectures. Participants will discuss historical, semantical and archetypal settings of the narratives.

Organising team:
Klaske Havik (TU Delft)
Panu Lehtovuori (Tampere University)
Jüri Soolep, Andres Ojari, Tiina Tammet, Irene Hütsi (EAA Tallinn)

The event is supported by the European Regional Development Fund

Joosep Kivimäe’s solo exhibition “I Love You” will be open in the Showcase Gallery of EKA’s department of photography from September 15, 2021. The exhibition is  a part of the satellite programme of Tallinn Photomonth 2021.

The Showcase Gallery is located on the facade wall of the Contemporary Art Museum of Estonia (EKKM), Rumbi Str 3 / Põhja pst. 35, Tallinn).

In his artistic practice, Joosep Kivimäe contemplates mainly the structures and hot spots of contemporary consumer society. He is also intrigued by the vague borders between public and private infosphere in the context of the present era of information.

The artist comments on his present exhibition as follows:
“The ephemeral beauty of cut flowers is preceded by a long and exhaustive period of growth and fertilizing after which the flowers are transported to various locations within thousands of kilometers. COVID has provided a good chance to look at the underlying structures of our society. Instead of trying to return to “normal” life, one should redefine the concept of normality. The present day should be used as a fertile ground for replanting ideas and visions for the future as well as for rooting out obsolete negative habits and beliefs.”

Joosep Kivimäe (b. 1994) is a photographer who lives and works in Tallinn. Kivimäe is currently obtaining his BA degree in the department of photography at the Estonian Academy of Arts. In 2020, Joosep Kivimäe participated in the Noorderlicht International Photo Festival in the Netherlands with his artwork “Umbrella of Illusion”. The same year he
participated in the extensive art project “Isolation Dialogues” (visual dialogue with photographer Rait Tuulas) held by the Estonian Museum of Photography. Kivimäe’s artwork
has been exhibited in several exhibitions, including “Lõuna” (“South”) on the display window of the former Võru Shopping Mall (2020); jubilee exhibition of the Estonian cultural weekly
newspaper SIRP “Hulgad”; held in the tunnel of Tallinn Baltic Railway Station (2020), and exhibition “Still Life”; held in the EKA Billboard Gallery (2021).

The Showcase Gallery can be viewed 24/7 and has wheelchair access.

More information:
Maris Karjatse
Co-ordinator of the Showcase Gallery
Department of Photography at the Estonian Academy of Arts
maris.karjatse@artun.ee

The Tartu Art Museum is pleased to present the solo exhibition “Verbarium” by Krista Leesi. Visitors will be greeted by a world of patterns inspired mainly by Tartu but also by Paris and Tallinn. As the title suggests, the author uses nuanced wordplay to offer new interpretations to the Leaning Building of Barclay de Tolly, where the museum is located, the two-storey sheds, or “kallerei”, that are so characteristic of the city, the graffiti covered traffic signs of Tartu and Paris and other elements from urban environments.

Krista Leesi (b 1966) is an Estonian textile artist and designer and associate professor at the Estonian Academy of Arts’ Textile department, whose oeuvre is characterised by a clever conceptual union of language and visuals. Leesi’s interventions offer new and pointed meanings to familiar objects, images and environments. She finds an original way to join together the historical methods and practices of textile art, different materials and contemporary ideas. Her works lead the viewer to discover hidden meanings, to create connections between various narratives and to indulge in playful contemplations.

The technically adept execution and striking design language of Leesi’s oeuvre offer aesthetic experiences and practical aspects in parallel with gripping content. This is a magnificent example of the way the boundaries between design and contemporary art have become vague.  Leesi’s works are made unique by the fact that both art and design are equally important: they are highlighted successfully and with intensity.

Krista Leesi’s exhibition joins together two directions that are important to the Tartu Art Museum: exhibiting significant contemporary authors and presenting notable examples of design and applied arts to the public in southern Estonia. It is made even more noteworthy by Leesi’s skill and interest in approaching the exhibition with location-specific ideas, by joining Tartu to the wider context of her oeuvre and thereby adding it to her “world map”.

Curator: Joanna Hoffmann
Graphic design: Heino Prunsvelt
Coordinator: Kristlyn Liier
Educational and audience programmes: Kristel Sibul

Exhibition team: Richard Adang, Tanel Asmer, Indrek Grigor, Joanna Hoffmann, Margus Joonsalu, Jaanika Kuznetsova, Katrin Lõoke, Taavi Piibemann, Anti Saar, Peeter Talvistu, Kristo Tamm and Urmo Teekivi

Supported by: the Cultural Endowment of Estonia

Mark Gottdiener’s public lecture “Postmodern semiotics” will take place on September 15th as part of the Training School seminar “Local Stories and Visual Narratives”.

The lecture will take place 15.09.2021 at 18.00–20.00 via Zoom and is open to the public in the lobby (A101).

Mark Gottdiener (b 1943) is a professor of sociology at University at Buffalo, specialising in urban sociology. He is called one of the most important Urban Sociologist in U.S.

Training School Local Stories and Visual Narratives for international PhD students will take place on September 15th – 16th in Estonian Academy of Arts. It is organised by EU COST action CA18126 Writing Urban Places.

The action proposes an innovative investigation and implementation of a process for developing human understanding of communities, their society, and their situatedness by narrative methods. It particularly focuses on the potential of narrative methods for urban development in European medium-sized cities. This COST action has 35 European countries as participants.

The Training School in EAA will focus on local urban stories, taking the city of Tallinn as an example. Participants will engage in site visits, analysis workshops, discussions and lectures. Participants will discuss historical, semantical and archetypal settings of the narratives.

Organising team:

Klaske Havik (TU Delft), Panu Lehtovuori (Tampere University), Jüri Soolep, Andres Ojari, Irene Hütsi, Tiina Tammet (EAA Tallinn)

The event is supported by the European Regional Development Fund

Open lecture of the Institute of Art History and Visual Culture of the Estonian Academy of Arts, in cooperation with and the Estonian Centre for Environmental History at Tallinn University on September 17 at 4pm.

Five-thousand Parisian farmers grew vegetables for two million Parisians at the turn of the nineteenth century. Black residents of Washington, DC paid down on their homes during the Great Depression by maintaining gardens on their urban lots. Soviet and Cuban urbanites staved off a famine in the 1990s after the collapse of Soviet agriculture by farming urban peripheries. These stories have been missed in plain sight because they do not coincide with ideas of urban progress and neat categorizations dividing urban from rural. Recapturing these stories points to the efficacy of small-holder intensive farming in urban areas which produce a wealth of waste than can be recycled into nutrients. These stories also point to a history of urban commons and mutual aid societies that undermine triumphal or inevitable histories of capitalism.

Kate Brown is a Professor in History of Science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology whose research interests illuminate the point where history, science, technology, and bio-politics converge to create large-scale disasters and modernist wastelands. She is the author of several prize-winning books, including Plutopia: Nuclear Families in Atomic Cities and the Great Soviet and American Plutonium Disasters (2013), and Manual for Survival: A Chernobyl Guide to the Future (2019). Her studies on Chernobyl point to the lasting impact of the nuclear catastrophe, but also to the role of local specialists and communities in coming to terms with its effects, as also explained in this interview. In the framework of her new project on urban gardening Kate Brown does fieldwork also in Estonia. She also discusses the reasons why we should recapture the stories of urban gardening in the article Resurrecting the Soil.

More information: https://sts-program.mit.edu/people/sts-faculty/kate-brown/

The language of the lecture is English.

The lecture is organised in co-operation between the Institute of Art History and Visual Culture of the Estonian Academy of Arts, the Estonian Centre for Environmental History at Tallinn University and the Centre of Excellence for Intercultural Studies at Tallinn University. Kate Brown is the visiting leading researcher at the Centre of Excellence for Intercultural Studies at Tallinn University, funded by the EU Regional Development Funds in the framework of Tallinn University’s ASTRA project (activity A7).

Amongst the many well-known international photo artists at Art Fair Foto Tallinn, organized by the EKA photography department born Estonian Photographic Artists’ Association and the Estonian Contemporary Art Development Center, EKA Young Artist Prize winner Sten Eltermaa, EKA photography alumni Sigrid Viir, Paul Kuimet, Kristina Õllek, Krista Mölder and Cloe Jancis are exhibiting.

Art fair Foto Tallinn 2021 takes place from September 2nd to 5th at Kai Art Center. The fair is  dedicated to introducing a wide range of contemporary photography, and its 10th edition will feature the latest works by 37 Estonian and international participants. The fair welcomes artists and galleries from 12 different countries across the world. 

As the opening event of the 6th Tallinn Photomonth Biennial, Foto Tallinn offers exhibiting artists, galleries and project spaces an opportunity to introduce their works to a diverse audience and grow their network of professional contacts.

Foto Tallinn’s diverse programme includes book launches, artist talks, panel discussions, webinars, and curated tours of the fair. The program can be found here. The list of artists, gallerists and project spaces taking part in the fair can be found here.

Foto Tallinn is open Thursday to Saturday from 11am to 8pm and Sunday from 11am to 6pm. The fair tickets are available on-site or can be bought in advance here.

Foto Tallinn 2021 is curated by Isabella van Marle: “At Foto Tallinn 2021 we will present work by galleries and many emerging artists with different backgrounds, and practices. Participating artists are adopting multidisciplinary approaches, experimenting with the materiality of the medium and work amongst others with computer vision photogrammetry, installation and sound.”

Visiting Foto Tallinn is a great way to discover contemporary photography and meet artists and gallerists who will be present during the fair days. The fair also offers an opportunity to learn more about collecting (photographic) art. The Foto Tallinn team will be available to advise visitors in their selection.

Foto Tallinn 2021 is organized by the Estonian Union of Photography Artists and the Estonian Contemporary Art Development Center.

 A selection of press images can be found here.

* We kindly ask all visitors of Foto Tallinn 2021 over the age of 18 to present a COVID-19 certificate (proof of vaccination, proof of having recovered from COVID-19 in the past 180 days, or proof of a recent negative test) and your ID to participate in the event. There is no rapid testing on-site. Please note that if you do not present a COVID-19 certificate, you will not be allowed to participate in the event and your ticket will not be reimbursed.

As part of the workshop, EKA students design shoes for children in an orphanage.

12 foreign students from 8 European countries from the departments of product design, jewelery, ceramics, architecture, graphic design, photography are participating, none of whom have made shoes before.

12 children of Tallinn Children’s Home are also learning to design and make shoes. The workshop also marks the 20th anniversary of the orphanage.
Supervisors are Kelian Luisk (EST), Macarena Gimenez (IT), Nicolas Denolle (FR)

Macarena Gimenez is an Argentine-Italian footwear maker with a studio in Denmark. Nicolas Denolle has long been a graphic designer for the world-famous brand Camper and now works for Apple. In this workshop, Denolle will guide the illustration.

The workshop takes place in two parts. For two days, students make shoes for the children and then illustrate them.

According to the color chart and the given theme, the students help the children to make designs for the shoes and then the children transfer their homemade drawings / motifs to their designed shoes.

This is an Erasmus workshop in the Accessory and Binding Design Department of EKA.

Estonian Academy of Arts is launching a new event series called ROHEKA which promotes green lifestyle and sustainable development topics in EKA. The series consists of one-day events taking place once a month, focussing on important topics like waste management, sustainable learning, community, work environment, energy efficiency, etc.

The first event of ROHEKA series will take place this Wednesday, September 1, when EKA will introduce its sustainability principles and share tips for sorting physical and digital waste.

The day starts at 10am with presentations, continues with a playful online waste-quiz and ends with collective cleaning in EKA building. The first half of the event will take place digitally and will be broadcast on EKA TV. Collective cleaning, starting at 12.30, takes place all over the house. We’ll gather in EKA courtyard.

PROGRAMME

10.00 Introduction of the ROHEKA event series (EKA TV)

10.15 Lecture “Green EKA” (EAA TV)

11.00 Introduction of the RING application (EKA TV)

11.15 PAUSE

11.30 Waste quiz – registration form HERE. EKA merch as a prize! (registered users will be sent a link to the online quiz)

12.00 Lecture “Digital Waste” (EKA TV)

12.30 Collective cleaning of EKA building under the guidance of environmental specialist Johanna Vahtra. (We’ll gather in the courtyard)