The Estonian Museum of Applied Art and Design opens the 2019 programme with the exhibition “Objects of Attention”, curated by anthropologist Francisco Martínez.
In this exhibition, ordinary things are revised into objects of attention. Ten artists have been invited to reflect on the capacity of artefacts to spark political concern and raise awareness of actual social challenges. Through the engagement of these artists with and through the expressive (material, design, functional, indexical) potential of things, everyday items have been transformed into devices for thinking about the contemporary — through topics such as migration, gender, environmental sustainability, digital rubbish, obsession with changes, and the role of humans in an automated world. The project is intended to transgress conventional ways of making, analysing, and representing things, exploring alternatives ways of producing knowledge. Also, it contributes to debates about the relationship of an artwork to its society, matters of aura and intentionality, the intrinsic properties of artefacts, as well as exploring the intersections from which the dialogue between contemporary art, anthropology, design, and museum studies can be brought forward.
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Francisco Martínez is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Helsinki and part of the editorial team of the Anthropological Journal of European Cultures. In 2018, he was awarded with the Early Career Prize of the European Association of Social Anthropology for his book Remains of the Soviet Past in Estonia. Martinez’ reflection upon material culture and his way of combining contemporary art and anthropology are intriguing for the Estonian Museum of Applied Art and Design, and significantly open the scope and practice in the field.
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Artists: Jussi Kivi, Laura Kuusk, Nino Kvrivishvili, Camille Laurelli, Eleonore de Montesquiou, Eva Mustonen, Emeli Theander, Timo Toots, Kirill Tulin, and Varvara & Mar
Graphic Designer: Ott Kagovere
Architecture Designer: Hannes Praks
The exhibition is open: 12.01-17.03.2019
Public Programme of the exhibition: “Experiments with Knowledge”
The public programme includes a performance at the opening of the exhibition; a research seminar with lectures and artists talks; two workshops and several guided tours in English and Estonian. A key proposition behind “Experiments with Knowledge” is that museums can be thought as places where things can happen and different participants can share experimental ways to connect their capacities together. In this light, the diverse events scheduled are not organised to know more, but to know differently and access to alternative forms of knowledge.
12.01.2019 Research Seminar
Moderator: Francisco Martínez
Participants: Eeva Berglund, Derek Holzer, Roomet Jakapi, Ott Kagovere, Jussi Kivi, Mihkel Kleis, Nino Kvrivishvili, Laura Kuusk, Camille Laurelli, Patrick Laviolette, Eleonor de Montesquiou, Eva Mustonen, Hannes Praks, Kirill Tulin, Timo Toots, Varvara & Mar
Practical workshops:
Saturday, 19 of January: Timo Toots / working with floppy disks.
Saturday, 16 of February: Varvara Guljajeva (from artist duo Varvara & Mar) / working with data cans.
Guided tours: Two tours by the curator in English (19 January and 16 of March) and in Estonian (16 February).
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The exhibition is supported by: Cultural Endowment of Estonia, Finnish Institute in Estonia and the University of Helsinki
