Exhibition “How to be Here”

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.