Estonian art history

TITLE. Change of Perspective. The Tallinn Period (1906–1909) and its Aftermath in the Life and Painting of Vilhelms Purvītis

ANNOTATION. All biographies of the prominent Latvian landscape painter Vilhelms Purvītis (1872–1945) and almost every overview of early 20th century Latvian art briefly outline the period between two dates in his career – 1906 when he left Riga for Tallinn (old Latvian: Rēvele; German: Reval) to teach drawing in two secondary schools and 1909 when he returned to head the Riga City Art School. Nevertheless, Latvian authors in their representation of Purvītis’ Tallinn period have left unnoticed that this city was not only the object of his impressions painted alongside his teaching duties but also a cultural centre where Purvītis’ art was highly appreciated by critics and the public alike. This continuous ignorance has resulted in misinterpretations and unverified assumptions.
Exploring the inner network of Baltic art life beyond the borders of present day national states, the author has attempted to fill in the existing gaps of knowledge. The sources of this study include originals and reproductions of Purvītis’ paintings of the Tallinn period, notices, reviews and advertisements in Baltic German, Latvian, Estonian and Russian periodicals from 1906–1909, catalogues of exhibitions and museum collections, documents in Estonian and Latvian archives as well as the memoir of Purvītis’ Tallinn pupil Alfred Rosenberg whose shameful role in the history of the Third Reich does not detract from the fact that some episodes of his Last Notes give illuminating evidence about the activities of the Latvian painter in the Estonian capital. The main intertwined questions in the article refer to Purvītis in the art scene of Tallinn and the representation of Tallinn in his painting while also tracing the aftermath of this period in his later life and work.

Ristimiskivi oli keskaegses kihelkonnakirikus üks tähtsamaid liturgilisi esemeid, mida kasutati esimese ehk ristimise sakramendi läbi viimisel. Sageli on keskaegsed ristimisnõud ka vanimateks säilinud kirikukunsti teosteks meie pühakodades. Kuigi keskajal oli ristimiskivi olemas peaaegu kõigis kihelkonnakirikutes, on neid tänaseni alles väga vähe. Käesolevasse raamatusse on koondatud andmestik rohkem kui 20 keskaegse ristimiskivi või nende fragmentide kohta. Uurimus annab ülevaate nii tänaseni säilinud kui ka fotode põhjal teadaolevatest, kuid hävinud või kaduma läinud ristimisnõudest. Raamatus käsitletakse ristimiskivi ajaloolist arengut, selle asukoha muutusi kirikuruumis, ristimise juures tarvitatud esemeid ja keskaegsete ristimiskivide kasutamist reformatsioonijärgsetel sajanditel. Lisaks tutvustatakse ristimise ajaloolist arengut ja ristimise läbiviimist keskaegsel Liivimaal.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the restoration of Estonia's independence, it has become commonplace to emphasize that at least during the latter stages of Soviet occupation most Estonian artists (or at least those with worthwhile artistic legacy) worked in relative autonomy from the Soviet official ideological and artistic discourses. Jaak Kangilaski has influentially argued that three competing discourses existed in Estonian art throughout the Soviet period. These were the discourse of the Soviet ideology and regime, the discourse of the avant-garde, and the nationalist-conservative discourse. The majority of the figures active on the artistic scene inhabited a grey area between the discourses, so that each fraction was able to interpret their output in a manner that suited their particular objects and ideals. During the first half of the Soviet period (until the end of the 1960s) the nationalist-conservative fraction and the avant-garde minded fraction formed an alliance against the Soviet power minded discourse, forcing the latter to retreat. As a consequence, a relatively moderate, even bourgeois model of autonomous apolitical art came to dominate Estonian art from the end of the 1960s. 1

Conventionally, the Estonian architecture history tends to address the late Soviet postmodernism up to the mid-1980s, and then resume with buidlings of the independent republic from the mid-1990s. The period in between constitutes a kind of gap, and indeed, there was a remarkable decline in building activities. Nevertheless, it was a highly loaded period of active production of new social space, establishment of public sphere and public space, and rethinking of the relationship between built environment and its subject. Those processes continue to have a noted impact on our spatial and social environment up to this day. The doctoral thesis challenges this conventional periosidation of the history of Estonian architecture and art, focusing on the era between two more or less clearly defined social formations – the interregnum of 1986–1994 which must not be treated as a temporary transition on the way to ’normalcy’ but as a specific period of abundant creativity worthwile in its own right. During this dynamic era certain late Soviet practices continued while accelerated appropriation and interpretation of new western impulses took place. The transition from one spatial regime to the other did not happen as a clear and definitive cut but rather as a process that was hybrid, fluid and uneven. The dissertation demonstrates how the production of new space took place on various interconnected levels: built and planned, dreamt and imagined, performed and enacted, as well as theorised and reflected.

The monographic thesis encompasses five loosely connected case studies. The chapter Unbuilt space analyses the most vivid examples of the large amount of unrealised architecture projects and urban designs, focusing on aspects such as production of new public space, identity building and the architects’ agency. Utopian space looks at artist Tõnis Vint’s vision of a new high-rise urban settlement on Naissaar island near Tallinn, proposed as a free trade zone, considering the case in the context of international economic developments and New Age ideologies. Discursive space focuses on the two first instances of Nordic-Baltic Architecture Triennials as attempts at establishing an international platform for theoretical exchange, demonstrating the different expectations of the Nordic and Baltic participants
and diverging positions regarding the issue of regional architecture in the global context. Performative space investigates the architecture and performance practices of Group T as an interconnected phenomenon, aiming at establishing temporary counterpublic spaces and an alternative concept of community to counteract the nationalistic social tendencies of the era. Institutional space looks at the renovation process of the functionalist Tallinn Art Hall as a conceptual processual work of art by George Steinmann, demonstrating the artist’s agency in establishing international transdisciplinary networks and reconceptualisating the artspace as a multivalent discursive space. The chapter also addresses the project’s inevitable entanglement with certain neocolonialist allusions and the restitutional mentality of the era, fuelled by the desire for rebirth of the pre-war republic.

The case studies demonstrate that the Estonian architecture culture from the end of the 1980s to the beginning of the 1990s was far from in hibernation: quite the contrary, it was unprecedentedly vigorous and operated in active dialogue with other processes in the production of space for the new society. Making use of the radical openness of the
era, the architecture of the interregnum built upon the previous late Soviet experience and realised some of its desires. It also tested out new impulses connected with the opening up of the society. The experiments stemmed from a belief in creative individuals’ essential role
in imagining future space and their right to participate in the public sphere, thus helping to keep open the discussions of possibilities. The spaces thus produced might have been intangible but they were nevertheless vital in shaping the social life of the interregnum.

Katrin Kivimaa "Rahvuslik ja modernne naiselikkus eesti kunstis 1850-2000" põhineb autori Leedsi Ülikoolis kaitstud doktoritööl, mis keskendus sellele, kuidas soolisustatud kujutised ja kriitikamudelid on vorminud kunsti loomist ja professionaalset kunstikirjutust. Tegemist on nn uue ehk kriitilise kunstiajaloo traditsiooniga suhestuva uurimusega, mille eesmärgiks on vaadelda kunstiteoseid ja nende retseptsiooni ajaloolises kontekstis ning tuua nähtavale kunsti ideelised ja ideoloogilised alustalad. Raamatus esitatud juhtumiuuringud vaatlevad eesti kunsti ajaloo peamisi perioode alates 19. sajandi teisest poolest kuni kaasaegse kunstini. Käsitletud kunsti ajatelje sisse Kölerist Mare Trallani mahuvad lisaks nimetatutele veel August Weizenberg, Karin Luts, Erna Brinckmann, sotsrealistlik Evald Okas, Marju Mutsu, Kai Kaljo jt.

Paper presented at the NNCORE conference at Helsinki University, May 2013. Brief analysis on Priit Pärn's comic book for children called Tagurpidi (transl. In Reverse) from 1980, with a focus on the avant-garde influences and potentially subversive message contained within. The entire book can be seen online here: http://home.cyber.ee/arne/tagurpidi/ (click for next page)

Estonia's most outstanding collection of ecclesiastical art from the Medieval and Early Modern periods is exhibited at the Niguliste Museum, a branch of the Art Museum of Estonia.  With rich pictorial material, this over 100-page book introduces medieval altarpieces, wooden sculptures and Bernt Notke's famous painting Dance of Death. The book also focuses on ecclesiastical art from the Early Modern period. Readers will find information about coat-of-arms epitaphs, epitaphs, tombstones and chandeliers. A history of St Nicholas' Church and the story of its construction are included in the book, along with an introduction to the Silver Chamber.

Doktoritöö. Doctoral Dissertation.
TALLINNA ÜLIKOOL HUMANITAARTEADUSTE DISSERTATSIOONID
TALLINN UNIVERSITY DISSERTATIONS ON HUMANITIES 49
Juhendajad / Supervisors:
Krista Kodres, PhD, Eesti Kunstiakadeemia professor, Tallinna Ülikooli vanemteadur
Anu Mänd, PhD, Tallinna Ülikooli vanemteadur
Oponendid / Oponents:
Jüri Kivimäe, PhD, Toronto Ülikooli emeriitprofessor
Elina Räsänen, PhD, Helsingi Ülikooli dotsent

Doktoritöö digitaalsel kujul / digital version of the dissertation:
https://www.etera.ee/zoom/52367/view?page=1&p=separate&tool=info

In the 1950s and 1960s, the Western-established dichotomy between style and ideology, embodied by modernism and realism, was dominant. This dichotomy tended to suppress, marginalize or ostracize realism in the Soviet Union by reducing it to the leftist political project. This dissertation presents a critical reassessment of realism in the Soviet Union by challenging its representation as a monolithic phenomenon through the analysis of hyperrealism in the 1970s and 1980s. My analyses of Ando Keskküla, Jaan Elken, Semyon Faibisovich and Sergei Sherstiuk's hyperrealist artworks, based on Yuri Lotman's semiotic theory of culture, show the influence on their artistic production of the social and cultural system of signs of the Soviet society, as displayed in architecture, means of transport, and housing, along with the artist's personal agenda. Rather than the idealized conditions promoted by official doctrine, these artists adopted a unique strategy to subvert the predominan...

Whose rules determine how space is used or shared? Whose identity does a room express? The home is the place where power relations are established and contested. The article looks at how modern living space has shaped and been shaped by gender roles in Estonia.

This article reflects on the current explanatory value of concepts such as postsocialism and Eastern Europe by exploring how they are represented in contemporary art projects in Estonia. Through an overview of recent exhibitions in which I collaborated with local artists and curators, the research considers generational differences in relation to cultural discourses of the postsocialist experience. Methodologically, artists and curators were not simply my informants in the field, but makers of analytical knowledge themselves in their practice. Exhibitions were also approached as contact zones, whereby new cultural forms are simultaneously reflected and constructed. Critically, this inquiry gathers new ways of representing and conceptualising cultural changes in Estonia and novel perspectives of interpreting the relations to the Soviet past. The focus is put on art practice because of its capacity of bringing together global and local frames of reference simultaneously. The research also draws attention to the inbetweenness of the first post-Soviet generation (those born near the time of the breakup of the USSR); they are revising established cultural forms as well as historical representations through mixing practices, and therefore updating traditional ideas of identity and attachment to places.

In this chapter, I cast a gaze across the globe to consider artistic practices that suggest novel methods of addressing the gaps in material culture, or, the complete erasure of the subjectivity of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans*, queer, and intersexual (LGBTQI)-identified individuals in archives.  I consider San Francisco, California-based Tina Takemoto’s video Looking for Jiro (2011) alongside Tallinn, Estonia-based Jaanus Samma’s installation Not Suitable for Work: A Chairman’s Tale (2016). Takemoto explores the homoerotica and material connected to WWII incarceration camps that are part of gay Japanese American Jiro Onuma’s (1904-1990) archive, housed in the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society in San Francisco, California, whereas Samma considers documents that are culled from official Estonia historical archives regarding Juhan Ojaste’s (1921-1990) sodomy trial during the early post-war era.

Anu Põder (1947–2013) was one of the most significant and fascinating artists of contemporary Estonian sculpture and installation art. Her career began in the 1970s and continued actively until the 2000s. Most of her work dealt with family life, internal struggles and the emotional realm, framed by the constraining norms and taboos of post-/Soviet society. In contrast to her contemporary peers, Põder worked with ephemeral materials: textile, wax, plaster, soap, glue, plastic and wood. Most of the works set herself as a measure of the human experience and it could be said that her pieces even age like humans: they change colour, become deformed, disintegrate, and overall, their initial fragile nature becomes increasingly apparent and vivid over time. Throughout years, she supported her artistic practice by teaching at art schools, where she was widely beloved and is remembered by many contemporary artists of today.

Арт-критик Валерий Леденёв поговорил с директором KUMU — искусствоведом Кади Полли об особенностях восприятия прибалтийско-немецкого искусства и социалистического реализма в современной Эстонии, о беби-буме в музейной сфере в стране в 90-е годы, о взаимодействии с другими музеями Балтийского региона и о том, что мотивировало их к работе над выставкой «Самовоссоздание. Эмансипированная женщина в эстонском и финском искусстве», приуроченной к 100-летнему юбилею Эстонского художественного музея.

До конца апреля 2020 года в Художественном музее KUMU в Таллине работала выставка «Самовоссоздание. Эмансипированная женщина в эстонском и финском искусстве», посвященная искусству художниц двух северных стран и охватывающая период с 1850-х по 1950-е годы. Накануне ее открытия арт-критик Валерий Леденёв встретился в Таллине с ее кураторами Ану Аллас и Тийной Абель, с которыми поговорил о положении женщин в искусстве обеих стран, историческом контексте эмансипации художниц прошлого, о том, что удивило кураторов при подготовке проекта, а также о том, почему им удалось обнаружить так мало мужских портретов при отсмотре работ для выставки.