Riin Maide and Nele Tiidelepp at Tartu Kunstimaja

Riin Maide and Nele Tiidelepp  joint exhibition “Etudes with imaginary performers” in the monumental gallery of Tartu Art House.

The central idea of the exhibition is the meaningfulness of absence. The artists have observed the traces of activity in the space. Impressions are presented by media and materials.

Riin Maide and Nele Tiidelepp have been inspired by one of the first exercises of those learning to become actors: an etude with an imaginary object. The scene, the subject of which is usually taken from everyday life, is rehearsed as accurately and repeatedly as possible, so that correspondence to the previous reality is preserved even when the objects are removed. In their exhibition, they have left out the performers from the etude. The space and the objects (which try to imitate the presence of the performers as accurately as possible) are left to speak.

Riin Maide (b 1997) has acquired a bachelor’s degree in the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Estonian Academy of Arts, majoring in graphics, and furthered her education in the Department of Alternative and Puppet Theater at DAMU in Prague, majoring in scenography. In 2020, she received the EKA’s Young Artist Award and the Edmund Valtman Scholarship. Site specificity, ephemerality and graphic imagery are important in her work. Through playful installations and theatrical environments, she deals with memory and presence.

Nele Tiidelepp (b 1998) is an artist and writer who graduated the installation and sculpture department of the Estonian Academy of Arts. Her practice is motivated by spontaneous reactions to the environment and materials. Tiidelepp has won the Noor Tartu competition, EKA’s Young Artist Award, SIIL Prize and Millenium Prize, published texts in the journal “Värske Rõhk”, the newspapers “Müürileht” and “Sirp” and participated in exhibitions and art events in Estonia, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Portugal and Finland.

The exhibition is supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.
The exhibition is open until 2 October.

The EKA School Fair has started in the EKA lobby

30.08–02.09 & 05.09–07.09

Lots of EKA merch – things that you can wear, give, use, lose and find again. Mainly buy.

See you at the EKA Fair!

Fashion design from here and there. The opening of DiMa. 

There has been a little cell of circular design working around in the corridors of the Estonian Academy of Arts for many years now. It has done science, created new materials, experimented with different design solutions and mapped out textile waste, and eliminated it by circulating it back by using different design methods. The 19th of September is the day for bringing it all into the spotlight and making it official. It is the opening of DiMa.  

On stage, you can see fashion design that has been made from industrial leftovers and post-consumer textile waste that has seen more countries than passionate travellers can dream of. As one of the research topics of DiMa is circular design, specifically upcycling and recycling the show brings you design that has been made by using the before-mentioned design methods. An enormous amount of textile waste has been brought back into circulation through design. 

Participants:
Dr. Reet Aus
Cärol Ott
Sandra Luks
Kristel Aimee Laur
Marta Konovalov
Maria Kristiin Peterson
Yvette Agani
Bibi Mwanzala
Loise Wangari
Olivia Njeri
TOKU shoes  

The event is co-funded by Estonian Environmental Investment Centre and European Regional Development Fund 

DEAR FRIEND
15–29 September 2022
Opening. 15.09 at 6 pm
EKA Gallery, Estonian Academy of Arts

Dear Friend,

We have been thinking about you and we are looking forward to meeting you at the Dear Friend exhibition from 15–29 September 2022 at EKA Gallery. We hope you have time to pass by! The gallery doors open on 15 September at 18:00. 

Since 2019 we have been writing, folding, publishing, sharing and posting the Dear Friend publication. There are four seasons of published letters. This Fall seemed like the right time to meet after a few years of correspondence. It is a chance to talk about publishing, writing, small publications, doing things together, and why not just about how we are doing. 

The exhibition features all the published Dear Friend letters. The letters are available for you to read, take home or mail to another friend. Next to the letters there are projects and publications by our penfriends. These are mostly publications that connect with the Dear Friend project contextually, formally, community-wise and beyond borders. 

There is also a public programme that includes presentations of periodical publications and books; from 20–23 September readings and recordings of letters, programme Tracks as envelopes by oH radio; 24 September Dear Friend symposium, a day full of presentations and discussions; 29 September Dear Friend letter writing workshop and more. 

A catalogue will be published alongside the exhibition, with contributions by Singapore-based design writer Justin Zhuang, designer and writer Else Lagerspetz, and artist Lieven Lahaye. It will include published letters and a selection of photos of the activities. The book launch will take place at the symposium on 24 September. 

PUBLIC PROGRAM

16–29 September, EKA Gallery

16.09 17:00 artist Lieven Lahaye presents a new issue of Catalog

20.09–23.09 11:00–13:00 & 14:00–16:00 oH radio’s Tracks as envelopes, public readings of Dear Friend letters in the exhibition space. Come read one! 

22.09 18:00 presentation of Exercises in Practical Mischievery by Laura Pappa, Carlo Canun, Maki Suzuki

24.09 12:00–17:00 Dear Friend symposium and catalogue presentation. Come and join!

28.09 18:30 launch of the All Horses Are the Same Colour by EKA GD MA students 

29.09 18:00 Dear Friend letter writing workshop. Please join! 

SYMPOSIUM

24 September 12:00–18:00, EKA Gallery

Dear Friend symposium is a gathering where we explore practices and questions around experimental and self-publishing, mailing as a form of publishing, and design as writing through presentations and discussions. 

Symposium is held in English. 

12:00 Gathering

12:30 Presentation Undisclosed Relations, Henk Groenendijk 

Henk Groenendijk travels from Sofia, Bulgaria to open some boxes full of student publications, a selection of works from the Test Press exhibition, and copies of Test Press magazine. Henk will tell us about his library and collection of student publications and the links that are perhaps not visible. The connections are in the books, posters, and other paraphernalia. 

Heni Groenendijk is a collector, educator, and curator of Test Press Books. He worked as a professor at the Graphic Design Department of Gerrit Rietveld Academie and initiated the Rietveld & Sandberg Library Publications Archive. 

13:00 “A Lecture on Nothing: on the Legibility of Illegible Text”, Arja Karhumaa

What do typographic texts consist of? How does typography relate to language, image, and writing? How do you read illegible text? What is type beyond only form, as part of our coexistence and social environment? This performative talk has no answers to these questions but aims to stay with the trouble they make.

Arja Karhumaa is a text designer, a feral academic, and a language animal. She is Assistant Professor and Head of Programme in Visual Communication Design at Aalto University ARTS, Finland. 

13:30 open discussion

14:00–15:00 break/lunch

15:00 Presentation about de Appel’s publication The Remote Archivist, Nell Donkers

Nell Donkers, archivist of de Appel in Amsterdam will talk about The Remote Archivist, a recurring (one-page folded poster) publication from the Archive. There are four series of the publication that have been presented so far. The aim is to invite artists, thinkers, and readers to dive deeper into the archive and recalibrate the archive materials for their own practice. Bardhi Haliti is the designer of the project and of de Appel’s house style. 

Nell Donkers has managed the archive (library, archive, and collection) of De Appel in Amsterdam since 2002 and made it digitally accessible. 

15:30 Talk about Queer.Archive.Work and the resting reader, Paul Soulellis

Paul Soulellis’ talk will present his work at the nonprofit library, publishing studio, and residency Queer.Archive.Work in Providence, US with a focus on collectivity in the context of independent publishing. The resting reader is a book of texts and images assembled from source material found on the shelves of the Queer.Archive.Work library. The content was selected during the rise of the COVID-19 Omicron variant in December 2021, around the loose themes of rest, quiet, care, queer, sanctuary, reflection, collective, and generosity. 

Paul Soulellis is an artist and educator based in Providence, RI. His practice includes teaching, writing, and experimental publishing, with a focus on queer methodologies and network culture. 

16:00 open discussion

17:00 presentation of the Dear Friend catalogue, Ott Kagovere and Sandra Nuut

Ott Kagovere is a Tallinn-based graphic designer and the Head of the Department of Graphic Design at the Estonian Academy of Arts. 

Sandra Nuut is a curator at the Estonian Museum of Applied Art and Design. Previously she worked at the Estonian Academy of Arts and New York-based gallery Chamber. 

Exhibition concept/curation: 

Ott Kagovere & Sandra Nuut

Exhibition design

Ulla Alla & Nika Gabiskiria

Letters by
Alicia Ajayi, Stuart Bertolotti-Bailey, Claudia Doms, Nell Donkers, Maarin Ektermann, Rosen Eveleigh, Maryam Fanni, Saara Hannus, Eik Hermann, Paul John, Maria Juur, Ott Kagovere, Maarja Kangro, Arja Karhumaa, Kristina Ketola Bore, Nicole Killian, Rachel Kinbar, Tuomas Kortteinen, Keiu Krikmann, Kadri Laas, Else Lagerspetz, Lieven Lahaye, James Langdon, Jungmyung Lee, Kai Lobjakas, Michelle Millar Fisher, Maria Muuk, Sheere Ng, Sandra Nuut, Laura Pappa, Jack Self, Indrek Sirkel, Paul Soulellis, Triin Tamm, Laura Toots, Alice Twemlow, Loore Viires, Sean Yendrys, Justin Zhuang

Letter visuals by 

Mai Bauvald, Pärtel Eelmere, Martina Gofman, Kersti Heile, Laura Merendi, Mikk Oja, Rex, Johanna Ruukholm, Robin Siimann

Thank you

Andres Alliksaar, Louis Biasin, Rita Davis, Pärtel Eelmere, Maarin Ektermann, Mark Foss, Triin Jerlei, Mette Mari Kaljas, Kaur Karu, Kertu Klementi, Else Lagerspetz, Rasmus Lukas, Laura Merendi, Anete Ots, Laura Pappa, Steven Pikas, Lola Maria Pärna, Emma Reim, Filipp Rotšenkov, Maret Sarapu, Georg Ander Sild, Indrek Sirkel, Mariliis Tarja, Ljubov Terukova, Taylor Tex Tehan, Laura Tursk, Pille-Riin Valk 

Detailed program: facebook.com/events/440404928139944/440701844776919

Dear Friend web archive: https://gd.artun.ee/dearfriend/ 

Supported by Cultural Endowment of Estonia, Estonian Academy of Arts, European Regional Development Fund

See you soon!

Sandra & Ott

Space-installation “Kadri Goes Green”
Tallinn, gallery HOP,
Hobusepea 2 in Tallinn Old Town. 

Free entrance.

Motto of the exposition (according to art historian Tiina Abel who paraphrased her father,
a famous Estonian comic Ervin Abel):
Live in a way that if you collapse, then
everyone believes its from the utmost
happyness.

You’ll find yourself in a living-room, where there meet the try-outs of green turn and comics connected to these activities.

No pre-registration needed

Sten Saarits’ solo exhibition ‘Petrified’ open at Vaal Gallery.  The exhibition is curated by Eva Mustonen and remains open until 10th of September, Tue–Fri 12–6pm, Sat 12–4pm.

‘Petrified’ centers around the sense of detachment from the world and oneself, using familiar architectural forms from the city streets. Inside the exhibition space is created a backdrop of a nighttime cityscape, where the common feelings of this time and age such as anxiety and fear of the unknown are revealed in a new light.
The stillness of the night is a good time for gathering your thoughts, but it is also the time when illuminated screens and artificial lights compete most brutally for our attention.
The video and photo installations of the exhibition are defined by a continuous but aimless movement, where the characters in the videos or the motion mechanisms of the works themselves have succumbed to the endless loop.
The inability to turn around or to actively intervene in one’s surroundings brings attention to irrelevant details, where it falls into the folds of perception, like the blind but all-seeing eye. 

Sten Saarits (b 1987) is an interdisciplinary artist who works mainly with time based media. Saarits’ art practice, which emphasizes repetitions of themes and situations, is characterized by a drive to turn mental spaces into material landscapes to depict the states of mind, typical for the daily grind in a modern society, in a new form. Saarits has studied sound art (MA) and installation and sculpture (BA) in Estonian Academy of Arts. During the years of 2013–2014 he studied in the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, where his curriculum focused on sound art, performance and film. Saarits has shown his work in Estonia, Austria, Sweden, Finland, Netherlands, Denmark, France and Lithuania.

www.stensaarits.ee

Graphic design: Kert Viiart

On the 2nd of September the recent graduates and current second years of the Masters of Contemporary Art Program will hold a studio sale at Uus Rada, Raja 11a.

Participating Artists include: Brenda Purtsak, Eero Alev, Heli Haav, Jamie Dean Avis, Janne Lias, Johannes Luik, Junny Yeung, Katariin Mudist, Kati Müüripeal, Lily Marleen Verilaskja, Maris Paal, Marleen Suvi, Maryliis Teinfeldt-Grins, Noah E. Morrison, Olev Kuma, Samuel Lehikoinen, Solveig Lill, Sophie Durand, Triin Türnpuu, Tõnis Laurson, Zody Burke

The aim of the event is to help generate sales of works to support the transition into professional practice following graduation and financing of projects to be produced in the final year of graduate studies. 100% of the money generated from sales will go to the artist. It will be a salon style exhibition, each artist will participate with up to 3 works in a salon style exhibition which will be held at Uus Rada (Raja 11a).

Available artworks can be seen AT THIS LINK 

Opening Reception:

2nd September 2022 – 19:00 – 22:00

The exhibition will be open to the public

3rd September 2022 from 12 – 18

4th September 2022 from 12 – 18

Sold works will be available for collection on the 5th of September.

Please contact Sophie Durand for more information at sophie.durand@artun.ee or +37256256468

FB: https://fb.me/e/2HiBXu8cc 

Open Dual Lecture on Monday: two speakers, one global issue – housing crisis 

On September 5, the Estonian Academy of Arts will organize an open conversation/ lecture with two speakers, where academic knowledge and business experience will join forces to discuss an important topic in both Estonia and Europe – the looming housing crisis. The conversation/lecture will take place in the Botik bar of Põhjala Factory in Tallinn. Doors open at 5.30 p.m., the event with live broadcast starts at 6 p.m.

On behalf of the Estonian Academy of Arts, Dr. Sille Pihlak, Associate Professor of the Faculty of Architecture, Sara Paganin, head of social housing, Finanziaria Internazionale Investments SGR SpA, Conegliano/Milano, will arrive in Tallinn from Italy. The conversation will be moderated by Madle Lippus, deputy mayor responsible for urban planning issues in Tallinn.

The real estate price rally has created a situation in major Estonian cities where there is not enough affordable housing available for either renting or buying. People in households with lower incomes find themselves in a particularly difficult situation – and once they are forced to move further away from their workplaces, to places where housing is cheaper, there will in turn be greater pressure on the city’s transport network, and the ecological footprint of the citizens and thus the city will increase.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the standard project of the so-called Lender’s house was developed in Tallinn, which offered the opportunity to build affordable and need-based housing for people who had just moved to the city. Today, we do not have such a solution for affordable housing. But what would it take to develop it? How to create a standard project of an affordable community-needs-driven apartment building, and what would it require from the developers, the communities themselves, the local government and the state? How to make sure a firefighter and a teacher could also afford to live in Kadriorg, Kalamaja, or in the city center? What should be changed in the structure of our apartment buildings – architecturally – to make housing more affordable, how to divide and share the space? We will talk of all this on September 5th, analysing Italian experience, considering the possibilities provided by contemporary architecture and construction technology, and searching for solutions in dialogue that would be suitable in Tallinn.

The relevance of the topic is evidenced by the fact that two of the seven finalists for the 2022 Mies van der Rohe architecture award, the largest architectural award in the European Union, were community apartment building projects built from wood: the La Borda co-operative building in Barcelona and the 85 social apartments project in Cornellà. There are already communities and developers in Estonia as well, who have set as their main goal the creation of denser, more cohesive, and therefore more resilient communities.

The lecture is open to all interested parties, but community leaders, real estate developers, urban planners, architects and interior architects, and officials dealing with planning in local governments are especially welcome.

This public dual lecture takes place within the framework of the Transform4Europe project: T4EU, consisting of seven universities, operates under the European Universities Initiative with the aim of making European higher education more competitive, based on European values ​​and identity. The focus of the Transform4Europe project is primarily the issues of the digital transformation and digital smart regions, environmental issues and sustainability, social development, community development and inclusion. The housing crisis issue, which will be discussed in Tallinn on September 5, is connected to all these topics.

More information: http://www.transform4europe.eu 

EKA website in Estonian: https://www.artun.ee/akadeemia/rahvusvaheline/t4eu 

What is the essence of the housing crisis? What is the Transform4Europe project? Find out more here and join us at Botik!

Social Design Days

8-9 September, EKA

In Estonia, 40.000 children are affected by mental illness. €164 million worth of food is discarded every year. And there is an urgent need to understand the difficult experience of the over 45.000 Ukrainian refugees that have arrived to our country. How could an expertise in social design help us to deal with these issues?

Twenty-two professionals in the field are meeting at the Estonian Academy of Arts to discuss questions such as: 

• What is the political impact of design?
• Why is design a social practice?
• And can we understand social transformations with design techniques?

The frontiers of design are rapidly expanding within society; In the recent years, design practice has moved beyond the ideation of commercial products and is more and more considered as a set of techniques for engaging with complex problems.  Hence, there is a need to open up the roles of design within wider economic and political issues.

As explained by Bori Fehér, leader of the Social Design Research HUB at MOME: “This event will contribute to giving form to a rapidly expanding field of study, developing new ways of inclusive design and social intervention in Estonia”.

EKA is opening a new MA programme in Social Design. Students will gain an understanding of design as a political force, while expanding their capacity to intervene in contemporary issues and comprehend social transformations.

Experienced colleagues from all over Europe are joining us to discuss the key questions in the field. For instance, Guy Julier has written about activism and the economies of design; Jesko Fezer about architecture and community making; Eeva Berglund about how to research environmental activism; Adam Drazin about design anthropology; Jussi Koitela about hospitality and interdisciplinary projects; Maija Rozenfelde about design institutions; Liene Ozoliņa about social theory; Bianca Herlo about bottom-up politics and civic infrastructures; and Alvise Mattozzi about innovation and sustainability, just to name a few key topics of expertise. 

Likewise, we are organising a series of experimental workshops and fieldtrips with local and international colleagues, exploring a wide range of issues, such as multi-species communication, mental health and indigenous rights.

As a result, Tallinn will become the European capital of Social Design in September.

Thursday, 8 September A-101

10:30 Round table: What can social design promise?

Participants: Bori Fehér (MOME Budapest), Guy Julier (Aalto), Alvise Mattozzi (Politecnico Torino), Ruth-H. Melioranski (EKA)

13:30 Open formats A-307

• Feral Tracking / Multispecies Conversari by Hermione Spriggs (UCL)
• Design for advocacy in the Global South by Nathaly Pinto (Aalto)

16:00 Field visit to Paljassaare by Andra Aaloe

Friday, 9 September A-306

10:15 Round table: When, where, with whom, what for? The social is not singular

Participants: Eeva Berglund (Aalto), Jesko Fezer (HFBK Hamburg), Bianca Herlo (UDK Berlin), Liene Ozoliņa (Latvian Academy of Culture)

13:15 Round Table: How do we evaluate interdisciplinary projects?

Participants: Adam Drazin (UCL), Jussi Koitela (Frame Finland); Maija Rozenfelde (Art Academy of Latvia), Indrek Sirkel (EKA)

15:00 Open Format: Social Design projects in EKA

• Ott Kagovere & Sandra Nuut: snail mail, redesigning the times and spaces that we give ourselves to say and understand things
• Eva Liisa Kubinyi & Maarja Mõtus, mitigating mental health problems among youth 
• Kristi Kuusk, social design for children with special needs
• Urmas Lüüs, loneliness of elderly people

16:15 Field visit to Lasnamäe by Maria Derlõš

Please, register here.

For more details, please contact:
Francisco Martínez
francisco.martinez@artun.ee / +372 58038079

This project of the Baltic-German University Liaison Office is supported by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) with funds from the Foreign Office of the Federal Republic Germany.

Four artists look into the future at a safe haven called Viljandi Old Water Tower from 5th of August 2022: Egle Ehtjen, Kelli Gedvil, Hanna-Liisa Lavonen and Helle Ly Tomberg with their exhibition ‘Expectations of the End’.

They explore how to relate to a world that is ending. Denial, fear, grief or reconciliation is on the table. You can also feel joy and wonder. One can be viewed from humanly close or cosmically far.

The end of the world is getting closer every minute.

Reality as we know it is stretched to the breaking point, there is no sense of security and there is a bittersweet smell of ozone in the air. The world around us is in active war, society is crumbling, climate change and everything that comes with paints the future in very hopeless tones.  

The feeling of being surrounded by global disasters as well as personal tragedies that shatter our personal core, have followed people forever. We have been born into these conditions, carry that fragile and heavy weight around daily knowingly that there is more ahead. Any catastrophe hasn’t been the last of its kind.

The future depends on self.

Our gratitude goes to: Marek Gedvil, Leegi Kiis, Svetlana ja Johannes Lavonen, Ian-Simon Märjama, Kristen Rästas, Sten Saarits, Jan Viilma, Tiina Vändre

Graphic design by Henri Kutsar

The exhibition is supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia, Nudist

The exhibition ‘Expectations of the End’ will remain open until 31st of August 2022

Viljandi Old Water Tower is located at Johan Laidoner plats 5.

It is open for visitors Mon-Fri from 11 AM to 6 PM.