Udujutt / Fogspeak: 13 jewellery artists from Estonia in Riga

Artist list

Sofia Hallik, Nils Hint, Piret Hirv, Julia Maria Künnap, Kristiina Laurits, Eve Margus-Villems, Kadri Mälk, Maarja Niinemägi, Villu Plink, Darja Popolitova, Ketli Tiitsar, Maria Valdma, Tanel Veenre

13 Estonian artists with a collective national identity background, folk traditions and history, yet they all are so distinct from one another – each with their own individual identity and character. They are like a metaphor that unifies discrete individualists, each with his or her own signature style. The only true thing that unites them is their desire to unlock their own imaginative world using jewellery as the key.

Tanel Venre: Our artisan culture is rooted in the forest. It sounds simple, but it is exactly in this feature that there is magic. The archaic yet clean wooden style is at the base of all abstraction. There is no need for noise here; whispers are loud enough. Estonian is the only language in the world in which the word for jewellery and sincerity is one and the same – EHE.

Thomas Cohn, a prominent Brazilian gallerist representing Galeria Thomas Cohn in San Paolo, as a bright meteor came to Tallinn to see, get to know the contemporary Estonian jewellery he had heard about. Falling in love with it, he arranged to bring it back to Brazil. Galeria Thomas Cohn premiered the ESTONISHING! jewellery exhibition at Schmuck 2016, the contemporary art jewellery event at the Munich International Skilled Trades Fair.

At the core of the group are two pillars of contemporary Estonian art: Kadri Mälk, internationally renown jewellery artist and a professor in the Jewellery Department of the Estonian Academy of Arts; and Tanel Veenre, the collective’s mouthpiece, who is also a professor in the Faculty of Design at the Estonian Academy of Arts as well as a photographer, lecturer, and member of many international exhibitions.

Each artist showing work in the exhibition is one of a kind. The artists are both united and contrasting at the same time. When looking at the jewellery that they have created, one senses that when making their pieces, these artists focus on spiritual qualities; the works on view have an introverted quality, perhaps even a touch of darkness to them – features that, just like a fixation on details, are so very characteristic of Northern peoples.

People speak about spiritual endeavors, the wish to be active outside the realm of physical reality. The ability to create noise and scraps while retaining a clear surface. The closeness of nature, the sensitivity of a fingerprint, and even if your ears are not within your field of vision, you cannot escape them.

A piece of contemporary jewellery illustrates a feeling of magic and temptation; much like a cult, nature is an intrinsic part of contemporary jewellery. It is safe to say that, having attracted the attention of the world, the jewellery artists of today’s Estonia form the foundation of the contemporary art jewellery platform. Of course, it is impossible to completely abandon form and context, yet make no mistake – an artist creates not only objects, but also the space for communication between the artwork and the person.