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| The discoveries of view finders Stella Pelše, Art historian Review of the exhibition Viewfinders: Contemporary Baltic and Nordic Photography at Riga Art Space 08.05.–05.06.2014 | |
| Carrying forward the efforts of the contemporary art exhibition re:visited to represent the contribution of foreign artists, riga art space organised another exhibition that fit well both within the framework of riga as the european capital of culture and a brand new tradition, the riga photomonth festival. as aiga dzalbe wrote in the exhibition catalogue, “Viewfinders focuses on the modern person’s quest of self-discovery, finding one’s private space and the questions that a person asks oneself. (..) just like it is in the latvian mentality to be romantics and individualists, other nordic people will also most likely choose to walk the solitary road.”1 nordic people consist of the swedes, norwegians, danish, icelanders, finns, estonians and also lithuanians, the latter though like to position themselves in central europe. of course, latvians are nordic, too. is this regional mentality capable of balancing thematically unavoidable and collectively topical characteristics of contemporary art? and should it? indeed, ecological concerns, the mapping of female identity and socio-political accents can also be found here. but it is not impossible that the nature of romantics and loners calls the attention to the sensitively emotional and figurative side of the artworks. Firstly, it has to be noted that the exhibition also included video works, and one has to concede that a film in its deepest essence is a sequence of moving photographs. of course, photography has become an instrument for the expression of a concrete message (which cannot be conveyed only through words). a photograph can be transformed in various ways, processed, used as an element of an installation, and it does not necessarily have to be taken by the artist – a fact that is by now self-evident in the context of contemporary art. another feature that characterises the majority of the exhibited works is an investigative seriality, the arranging of works into series that expand on a concrete idea or issue. | |
 Marie Sjøvold. Photographs from the series Midnight milk. 2011 Publicity photo Courtesy of the artist | |
| A number of the artworks depend on written commentaries to help the viewer perceive the encoded message, although that does not mean they cannot be interpreted without a written guide. for example, the film Svalbard by sarah gerats (norway) from the Guest series shows an endless journey – someone is carrying a box across fields, through forests, cities and other places – which turns out to be the road the art has taken to arrive at the exhibition. just like the aesthetics of relationships, not only does the process become more important than the result, but it transforms into the result, into the object that is being exhibited. without the written comments, the work can be characterised by using the slightly trite but useful axiom that the aim of life is life itself, not something that is out of reach and superior to life. without the written commentary, the series Former NKVD-MVD-MGB-KGB Buildings2 by indrė Šerpytytė (lithuania), which is a rather political work in its content, is also just a collection of strange, imitation-like older buildings. the buildings are isolated on a completely neutral background and detached from any reality (just like the objectives of the owners of the buildings were), and it is left up to each viewer’s imagination to visualise what could have happened in these kgb buildings of lithuania. On the other hand, the video installation Punane Koit (the red dawn) by marge monko of estonia, in which poetic panoramas of tallinn alternate with images of the restoration of a soviet banner on the building of a former sock factory, acquires a somewhat dramatic flair, given the current russian proclivity for imperial gains. the above-mentioned red hues can be associated with the colours of the dawn, but it still raises the question of certain nostalgic feelings and attempts to reanimate the soviet past. on the one hand, there is a consolation that in the post-soviet environment there may be a stronger immunity to such attempts than among the western leftists with their naïve ideals, but on the other hand, here we have to coexist peacefully with those who have no such immunity at all. Another work that deals in socially political aspects is the Wikiland project by thobias fäldt and klara källström (sweden), which reminisces about the now quiet WikiLeaks scandal that a few years ago saturated the media with the adventures of the controversial guru of free speech julian assange. the matchbox-size photographs of various everyday items (a discarded scarf, an outdoor grill in a garden, a flock of sheep) were taken during and in connection with assange’s trial. beyond the relative beauty of their work, the authors want the viewer to specifically think about his trial,3 but, frankly speaking, it was difficult to detect or construe a special meaning in these works. The exhibition also featured works with an ecological twist, represented by the icelandic artist pétur thomsen in the series Imported Landscape. the photographs show a landscape reminiscent of land patterns as seen from an airplane and document the construction of a hydroelectric power plant in iceland. in his comments, the artist is reluctant to take a strict position, instead saying: “the best way for me to participate in the debate was to follow the land in its transformation.” the portraits of forsaken plants by sara bjarland (finland) seem more depressing, where the small green shoots have no chance of survival. the breaking of twigs and tearing of leaves in her video installation Snap/Tear also point to our instinctive and unconscious aggression towards nature. the video is very direct and unambiguous and may seem one-sided, but at the same time exaggeration is a useful tool to make a message heard. | |
 Ieva Epnere. Kristīne. Photographs from the series Mothers. 2011–2012 Publicity photo Courtesy of the artist | |
| A more anthropocentric message is found in the works of ieva epnere. her video renunciation is a vivid painterly story about a catholic priest who gave up his ambition of being an artist in favour of serving “god and people”. what does it mean to renounce the secular life in the city in exchange for a religious life in the countryside? here art is not an innovative self-expression but the observance of norms and canons against a background of impressive nature, architecture, shiny fabric, the singing of the suiti people and priestly ritual clothes. in its time, art partially overtook the role of religion in the secular world, but this work exposes a uniquely opposite view, striving to reclaim the syncretic and whole worldview that both the adepts and opponents of modernism long for. the theme of renunciation from a female perspective is tackled by ieva epnere’s work Mothers, a series of portraits of women and their children in which the artist reflects the tension between the identities of artist and mother. the level of sincerity is truly convincing, as the work does not demonstrate an exaggerated story about superwomen who can juggle various roles in their lives, which often creates a feeling of inferiority in female viewers. in this work epnere fully implements the sociologically investigative potential by conveying a message that the tension between these roles is a reality, and besides, this reality does not depend on a personal decision or the factors of an unexpected coincidence. however, the portrayed characters also point the way to how a woman can avoid feeling like a loser and how she can transform her life experiences into further creative work (children being the ‘glasses’ that show the world, etc.). balancing several things in life is never an ideal situation, but the extension of one’s experience in several facets of existence is the foundation for a positive outcome (this, however, does not exclude the option of mastering one aspect by concentrating only on it). marie sjøvold’s (norway) photo series Midnight Milk is to a large extent about the same thing: “this essay is a photographic voyage through my own life, as i am trying to understand what happens to our identity and self-image when we have children” (from the exhibition catalogue). instead of verbal reflection, the photo essay offers images – supposedly mundane, fragmentary moments of being together interspersed with poetically misty motifs of landscapes and household objects, slightly reminiscent of a fairy-tale interpretation in the tradition of pictorialism. the photo essay does not give a concrete answer to the question the artist poses about identity and self-image, but nothing stands in the way of coming to one’s own conclusions. it may be that the only thing that is evident here is that a person has managed to see herself and her child as integral parts of the beauty of this world. At first glance, the video installation reflective Memories (a Portrait of Those Who Were) by joachim fleinert (denmark) may seem like a simple series of antique photo portraits, which was the impression i was left with during the bustle of the exhibition opening. upon closer observation, there is a surprise – the characters are winking. besides, the impression is that only the character you are looking at is winking at that particular moment. fleinert works with ready-made antique photos, in this case with the aim to reconstruct the moment the photograph was taken by placing the viewer in the role of the photographer, supposedly placing him in contact with the people being photographed even though he has never met them and would never have had the possibility to meet them. an even more surrealistic dream atmosphere dominates the photographs by astrid kruse jensen (denmark) – dark photos with brightly lit objects. a similar mood prevails in the works of the estonian photographer paul kuimet, in his photo installation Horizon, which warns viewers to orientate themselves correctly in a dark space, as well as his film Viewfinder, which has given its name to the exhibition. as stated in the exhibition guide, the material was filmed in an austrian village of catalogue homes, where, by definition, a ‘nostalgic atmosphere’ cannot exist. the visuals are supplemented with a reading of the short story Viewfinder by the american author raymond carver. fans of american literature may gain more understanding based on this fact; others can try to perceive the message of the story in the headphones provided at the exhibition or read the story at a later time. “Viewfinder poses perhaps the greatest challenge to the case for carver’s structured and meaningful symbolism. certainly its plot details – a photographer who has no hands, a narrator who ends up on the roof throwing rocks at nameless targets for no apparent reason – are the stuff of surrealism.”4 however, the intended contrast between the image and the essence of the story based on unidentified dreams seems too hypothetical and ethereal. In contrast, the ‘photo-humour’ segment of the exhibition is characterised by well-lit photographs showing demonstrative and discernible processes. it turns out that it is possible to sit under a desk in the office and assume various odd poses, as demonstrated by lars tunbjörk from sweden. the humour section also includes lithuanian photographer mindaugas ažušilis’ works from the series Happiness in Lithuania – kitschy fun in the water and other jovial activities of the hybrid post-soviet zone, but the absolute favourite is the photograph of unmistakably happy lithuanian lads sitting in a hot tub on wheels as it is towed behind a truck laden with felled logs. another humorous escapade is the entertaining karaoke-style slide show with appropriations of works by latvian photographers accompanied by a popular song in which the words have been slightly changed. this work seems to be provocatively addressed to an audience of photographers and photography experts, as less informed viewers will likely not recognise the authorship and simply enjoy looking at various landscapes (mostly countryside and small towns) accompanied by jolly music. Overall, it is not surprising that the many ‘view finders’ have found very diverse segments of the world, and it is obvious that the aim of the exhibition was not to find a common denominator for the different photographic messages. rather, the exhibition demonstrated meaningfully, formally and emotionally multifaceted treasures as fragments of a bigger puzzle whose shape is for the time being vague and temporary. Translator into English: Vita Limanoviča 1 Dzalbe, Aiga. viewfinders: contemporary baltic and nordic photography. from riga Photomonth: [catalogue]. riga: committee of culture, 2014, p. 7. 2 The abbreviations used in the title: nkvd: the people’s commissariat for internal affairs; mvd: ministry of internal affairs; mgb: the ministry for state security; kbg: committee of state security. (translator’s note) 3 Abbe, Dan. Photographing another side of assange, and the things he touched. pub- lished online: www.americanphotomag.com/photo-gallery/2012/09/julian-assange- viewed-side. 4 Lehman, Daniel W. Symbolic significance in the stories of raymond carver. Journal of the Short Story in english, no. 46, spring, 2006. published online: jsse.revues.org/493. | |
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