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Jaanika Peerna

REAPPEARANCE OF ABSTRACT ART : exhibition review by Heie Treier

Published in KesKus in September 2013, p. 16

REAPPEARANCE OF ABSTRACT ART

by Heie Treier

Let us first shed some light on the background of the current exhibition since abstract art and its status still need some explanation.

Censoring abstraction

Abstractionism, that is the theory or practice of abstract art, has generally had a fixed meaning in the art history of 20^th century, associating with the triumphal culmination of Modernist movement where the art of painting lost figurativeness and took an interest only in its intrinsic issues (colour, line, canvas) and the metaphysics of idealistic philosophy. During the era of the Cold War, abstract painting also had a hidden political meaning, designating the economical, political and cultural hegemony of the United States of America along with the opposition to the attack of Socialism. In the Soviet Republic of Estonia in 1960s there were several cases where abstractionists were censored and one of the most charismatic abstract artists living in Tartu, Lola Liivat, was labelled as an American spy without her even knowing it. The form or aesthetics of art according to Modernist standards was almost a matter of life and death.

No wonder that at the end of the Cold War, during the era of the so-called Postmodern art in 1980s and 1990s, abstract art as formalism was pushed aside from the frontline of art since the new art theory with the background of social sciences was unable to give abstract art an appropriate meaning. And now, in the 21^st century, reappearance of abstractionism in the field of art can be observed, together with the actualization of modern art, both locally and internationally.

The abovementioned should serve as a prologue to the co-exhibition of Jaanika Peerna's drawings and Tuuli Mann's paintings in Haus gallery, Tallinn, Estonia. Jaanika Peerna's work is especially interesting considering the fact that after graduating from the academy of arts in Tallinn the artist moved to New York where she also obtained a degree of fine arts; thus, Peerna has indirectly joined the former political opponents of the Cold War while interpreting abstract art in a totally different way. And oddly enough, her work reflects both the traditions of Estonian female printmakers as well as American triumphal abstract expressionism.

Materialized nature

JaanikaPeerna won't mystify the birth of her artwork – in her public performances, the artist has revealed her creative process, willing to teach it to the audience. She seems to give both her mind and body to the forces of nature – the wind, the sea, the air, and the sound waves (high quality audio recordings of the sounds of nature) – while drawing lines on paper according to these forces. The images on paper are the occasional yet regular visualizations of materialized energy. Jaanika uses special soft graphite pencils that register the flow of energy either through delicate or strong movements. Jaanika tunes herself in hypersensitivity; she collaborates with other artists, including choreographers and dancers, even scientists such as her husband David Rothenberg - a philosopher and musician who has studied and documented the sounds of nature, the music of animals, birds and insects.

In the context of art history, there is the hypersensitivity characteristic to Estonian female printmakers of various generations (Marju Mutsu, Naima Neidre, Ülle Marks and others) in Jaanika's work; and on the other side, there is the painting technique similar to the one by Jackson Pollock who also placed his canvases on the ground during the painting process. In contemporary times, it is not a precondition for an artist to live in USA, to be male and to get drunk for working with a painting in order to release one's subconsciousness in a Freudian way. Abstract painting or drawing is no longer necessarily associated with emotional suffering (that was required from the artists in 1950s) nor with the interpretation of the aesthetics of Immanuel Kant where art had to be the symbiosis of ultimate spiritual suffering and ultimate joy in order to achieve sublimity.

Jaanika Peerna's delicate drawings have been born out of lightness while pursuing the surrounding processes and atmospheric vibrations that function the best when observing the course of line within the whole artwork.

The secure idea of the forest

The paintings of young artist Tuuli Mann are perfectly accompanying the abovementioned ideas – her artwork studies the phenomenon of Estonian forest that is inseparable from the natural and cultural identity of the country. In her abstract paintings, Mann depicts the forest mainly as a green, peaceful and secure place, following the deepest psychiological needs of a human being. What is probably being the objective here is to find the essence, the idea of the forest instead of its physical appearance. Indeed, it is an astonishing fact that the forest  (similarly to the sea) as a phenomenon has not been studied that much in Estonian art; perhaps the reason is that for local people the forest is too self-explanatory and common – but it is not so.

The combination of Peerna's and Mann's artwork is harmonious – both artists have chosen nature to be their primary source of inspiration, elevated into aesthetics.

Jaanika Peerna's and Tuuli Mann's co-exhibition „The Silence of Forest Sounds“ in Haus gallery is open until September 27, 2013.

translated from Estonian: Maris Karjatse

Drawn to Experience : group show at POP gallery, Brisbane Australia

An International Drawing exhibition featuring works on paper, video and live performance.

Drawn works by Gosia Wlodarczak (Australia), Morgan O’Hara (New York), Tony Orrico (Chicago, US), (Mar Serinya (Barcelona, Spain), Jaanika Peerna (New York/Estonia), William Platz (QCA Australia/ New York),Rebecca Kinsey (Byron Bay, Australia) and (myself )Kellie O’Dempsey (Australia) will exhibit drawing as an immediate and direct mode of art making. Drawn to Experience is an open inquiry into where Performance Drawing may fit into a broader understanding of contemporary art production.

POP Gallery (Postgraduates and Other Projects) Queensland College of Art | Griffith University

84 Merivale Street,

South Brisbane,

Queensland 4101

Exhibition Dates:                          Thu, 12 September 2013 – Sat, 21 September 2013

Opening Event:                               Fri, 13 September 2013

Gallery Opening Hours:                 11am – 4pm, Thurs – Sat

Drawn to experience is a group exhibition of performed drawings that discuss multi-disciplinary practice of drawing: an active, expansive and inclusive act.

This exhibition endeavors to identify understandings and methods of image generation through performed drawing or Performance Drawing.  Performance Drawing, is physical, gestural and  enables an inclusive form of cultural interaction, which incorporates the artist, the act of drawing as performance and the body as conductor, audience, participant and/or model.

As an interdisciplinary exhibition Drawn to Experience will consist of works on paper, digital drawings, photographic/video performance documentation and a live drawing performance.

As a mode of investigation Performance Drawing unravels and explores notions of public and private space, corporeality and immediacy. Drawn to Experience considers the aleatoric process of drawing as an inclusive and interconnected form of cultural interaction between the artist, the act of drawing as performance and the audience/or model.