The Weight of Nothing by Nathaniel Lazar. Ornaments of the Forest Floor by Maria Kiialainen & Portal by Kadi Veesaar at A-Galerii Windows

Artist list

Maria Kiialainen, Nathaniel Lazar, Kadi Veesaar

The Weight of Nothing by Nathaniel Lazar
Exhibition The Weight of Nothing presents a collection of minimalist adornments exploring the burden of form and memory in the absence of meaning.
Nathaniel Lazar (1994) is a goldsmith from New York who works and lives permanently in Tallinn. His main work involves crafting custom wedding and engagement rings that marry modern, minimalist aesthetics with traditional techniques. After completing a bachelor’s degree at Skidmore College (2016) with an Honors Convocation in Jewelry and Metalsmithing, he spent three years working as a bench jeweler for David Yurman gaining experience in the luxury jewelry industry. This is his first contemporary jewelry art exhibition.

The exhibition is supported by the Estonian Cultural Endowment.


Ornaments of the Forest Floor by Maria Kiialainen 
Ornaments of the Forest Floor is an installation by Finnish artist Maria Kiialainen, inspired by her ongoing exploration of wearable sculpture and the fragile balance between humans and nature. The work grows from her childhood memories of mushroom hunting—a practice passed down through generations in her family and a vital part of her cultural heritage.
For the Windows exhibition, Kiialainen draws inspiration from the threatened Stansvik forest in Helsinki. The installation features three large patchworked textile works, each representing a different landscape where mushrooms thrive: grassland, leafy forest, and decayed wood. Hidden within the textile surfaces are small mushroom figures—wearable sculptures crafted from natural materials, combined with experimental enamelling techniques. Existing both as intimate jewellery and as elements of the installation, they connect the scale of the body with the scale of the forest.
Through Ornaments of the Forest Floor, Kiialainen invites viewers to look closely into the layered landscapes of the forest and to reflect on the unseen networks that sustain biodiversity and connect us to nature.

Maria Kiialainen is a Finnish artist working with contemporary jewellery, sculpture, and installation. With a background as a glass artisan, she often combines copper, enamel, textiles, and natural materials in her works. She earned her MFA from Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design in Germany in 2020, where her diploma work received the Saale Sparkasse Art Prize. Kiialainen has been a finalist in major competitions such as Talente – Masters of the Future and the BKV Prize for Young Applied Arts. Her works have been exhibited internationally, with solo exhibitions in Berlin (2020) and at Taidekeskus Idä in Finland (2024), and are included in the Finnish State Art Collection.

The exhibition is supported by the Arts Promotion Center Finland and the Estonian Cultural Endowment​.



Portal by Kadi Veesaar 
In her solo exhibition Portal, Kadi Veesaar continues to explore the boundary between jewellery and sculpture, with her photographic work accompanying the pieces. Having previously worked mainly with metal as her material, Veesaar now presents works in stone, emphasising the fragility and tactility of an apparently strong material. Veesaar has been engaged with photography for nearly 20 years and has always used photography as a starting point for her jewellery, but Portal is her first exhibition where both are presented together. She writes about her work as follows:
Nowadays everyone is in a hurry, and it is almost impossible to switch off. How can one help themselves in this situation? How can you steal moments just for yourself and find relaxation? Sitting in front of my first canvas print of the “Portal” photograph, I suddenly discovered myself elsewhere. A place where no one could follow me. All this despite my child constantly tugging at me for attention, unfinished jewellery on the workbench, and a strawberry patch overrun with weeds waiting for care.
This is how the idea was born: to create a tool for myself and for others. A painting made with a camera, guiding you through dreamlike softness into the “Portal”. You can fly like a bird to places no one else can reach. Places where, for a moment, nobody expects anything from you, and you can simply be with yourself.
The “Portal” is accompanied by a handpiece – an object to hold in your palm, to sense its form and its curiously calming, cool surface. The painting belongs on the wall, while the jewel can be taken along, should you wish to enter the Portal outside your home.


Kadi Veesaar (b. 1976) is an Estonian artist whose work includes photography, jewellery, and objects. As a photographer she captures emotion, and as a jewellery artist she materialises it, expressing herself mainly through metal and stone. The relationship between jewellery and its wearer is essential to her practice. She encourages jewellery to be touched, sensed, noticed, and felt. Veesaar holds master’s degrees in textile technology/fashion design and in computer science; she studied jewellery at the Estonian Academy of Arts (2013–2015) and has done many courses abroad as well. Since 2015, she has been working as a freelance artist, has participated in numerous national and international exhibitions, and has taught at the Estonian Academy of Arts and at the University of Tartu Viljandi Culture Academy. Veesaar lives and works in Tartu County, where she has established a private studio, and she also works at the Cirrus shared studio in Tartu.

The exhibition is supported by the Estonian Cultural Endowment.