history
The historical background of the Tallinn Applied Art Triennials
2006 | 2003 | 2000 | 1997
Tallinn Applied Art Triennial 2000
POSSESSION
Even the simplest objects become parts of personal space – they become possessions. Moods, motivations, notions become reality; they materialize in a way they live in makers mind.
Meetings create obsessions; a need to possess objects long yearned for. Obtaining such objects provides the owner emotional satisfaction, it gives an environment that is replete – embryonic.
F.F.F.F. Kristi Paap, Kaire Rannik, Berit Teeäär, Ketli Tiitsar
Beautiful Things
Things are things for people. Nature does not have things; a natural object becomes a thing only in relation to people: they look at it, touch it with their hands, bring it to their houses. People are surrounded by things, in fact, they surround themselves with things. Some things are if natural origin, others are created by human beings themselves.
What for? Things are necessary, but the needs they satisfy are manifold: some satisfy primary needs (e.g. tools, etc.), some make living more comfortable, others have an aesthetic function. Such an utilitarian approach, however, is extremely primitive. It approves of things that satisfy primary needs, all the rest is associated with being weak and pampered. Modernism already tries to reunite the three functions of things: a thing should be useful, comfortable and beautiful at the same time. This is how the art of design is born. Design makes useful things not just necessary, but also desirable. Yet, another threat appears there.
Human beings own things. Being owned is an inherent parameter of things: one cannot own natural phenomena or people. Acquiring things mean acquiring things. (History, of course, knows epochs and cultures where people could be owned, but as far as nature is concerned, attempts to possess it continue to this day. In all these cases, both the human being and nature are treated as objects: if a person can be owned, bought and sold, he/she loses the qualities of a personality, turning into a thing.) Possessing works both ways: the owner is always in some way possessed by the thing he/she owns. Property needs protection and care: the bigger the property, the more it demands of its master, until the latter becomes owned by that very same property. Things conquer us.
But even if we do not look after our things, even if we think we do not care at all, they still accumulate around us, as though we were living in an antique shop with very little room, musty air and no connection between us and the things that distress us. This, too, means being overcome by things.
The traditional understanding of the relationship between a thing and space considers the space to be primary: it is there before we bring things into it; the more there are things, the less there is room.
Martin Heidegger tried to demonstrate that the relationship actually works the other way round: each thing creates its own room. Room is no longer anonymous, it becomes personal, it is the room of the particular thing. Paradoxically, a thing may take up the whole room, but it may also make it more spacious. The traditional contrasting of subject and object becomes more complicated: both create their own room and both have traits of an individual personality. Therefore, acquiring a thing does not simply mean taking it and bringing it into one’s room; first of all, bringing a thing into the room a person inevitably brings his/her own personal room along, too, so before a contact with the thing is established, the person’s room and the thing’s room get in contact with each other.
Designers and interior decorators have long been familiar with the above mentioned philosophical notion: for example, every furniture designer who approaches his/her task creatively, keeps in his/her mind’s eye not just the object that is to be created, but the whole room into which the object fits and which is, in turn, adorned by the object. Moreover, the designer thinks of the people to whom the object might appeal. Communication is established between a person and a thing, their relationship has certain traits of a dialogue.
The Russian poet Ossip Mandelshtam clearly understood that. He contrasted the Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilizations with Hellenism (by the latter he meant the culture of Mediterranean countries, mainly Greece and Rome): in the former, things rule over people, people become objectified; in the latter, things become anthropomorphic, things and people are linked by a system of internal connections. Thus, for Mandelshtam, Hellenism is not just high culture, it is first and foremost a type of connections linking people to the things surrounding them.
“Hellenism – it is an oven pot, an oven fork, a can of milk, household things, tableware, everything that surrounds the body; Hellenism – it is the warmth of the hearth regarded as being holy, it is every possession that links a human being to the world outside, each piece of clothing placed with a solemn shiver on the shoulder’s of one’s beloved. /…/ Hellenism is all about surrounding people consciously with objects instead of impersonal things, it is about things turning into objects, the outside becoming anthropomorphic and warmed up by the most subtle teleological warmth. Hellenism is every hearth at which there is a human being appreciating its warmth as something kin to his/her own inner warmth.” (Of the Nature of Word, 1921-22).
Hence, the problem consists not only in the necessity of a thing, but also in its comfort and beauty. Things that enslave people can, in some way, also be necessary and beautiful. It all depends on the yardstick: whether the purpose of things is to subject people to social or other structures that are above them, to place them into the room of things, i.e. the room over which they have no control, or vice versa, to link people’s room to the rooms of the things surrounding them. In the latter case, a human being does not attempt to rule over things and is not enslaved by things, either; they are rather like interlocutors. The criteria of usefulness, comfort and beauty are in that case not given, but derive from a person’s inner qualities and needs: a thing becomes mine not because I own it but because there are inner parameters connecting us. Things are not beautiful or ugly outside a context, they are beautiful in their own time, room, in relation to certain people, they are beautiful or ugly for somebody. Feeling that inner relation to an object, a person says, “This is just a beautiful thing”.
Mihhail Lotman
Participating artists:
Athanasia Andrianopolitis-Uhl / Germany
Inger Bergström / Sweden
Inese Brants / Latvia
Sigurd Bronger / Norway
Isabell von Brunn / Germany
Rian de Jong / the Netherlands
Ieva Dzintare Latvia
Rene Haljasmäe / Estonia
Claus Domine Hansen / Denmark
Makoto Hatori / Japan
Kimmo Heikkilä / Finland
Leida Ilo / Estonia
Audrius Janusoniš / Lithuania
Janis Jefferies / England
Raija Jokinen / Finalnd
Austé Jurgelionyté / Lithuania
Monika Järg / Estonia
Hanna Järlehed / Sweden
Päivi Kekäläinen / Finland
Guigui Kohon / Spain
Janis Kupčs / Latvia
Kamil Kuskowski / Poland
Agne Kuusing-Soome / Estonia
Urve Küttner / Estonia
Mae Lambing / Estonia
Kristiina Laurits / Estonia
Eero Lintusaari / Finland
Velga Lukaža / Latvia
Stefano Marchetti / Italy
Peteris Martinsons / Latvia
Susanne Matsché / Austria
Joung Mee Do / Australia
Merel Eva Meinen / the Netherlands
Orest Misjko / Latvia
Anda Munkevica / Latvia
Eija Mustonen / Finland
Tarmo Mäesalu / Estonia
Pia Nieminen / Finland
Kirsi Niinimäki / Finland
Kati Nulpponen / Finland
Aigi Orav / Estonia
Baiba Osite / Latvia
Helena Paakkinen / Finland
Laura Pavilionyte / Lithuania
Erika Pedak / Estonia
Katrin Pere / Estonia
Rait Prääts / Estonia
Silja Puranen / Finland
Anu Purre / Estonia
Inni Pärnanen / Finland
Ülle Raadik / Estonia
Lija Rage / Latvia
Maruta Raude / Latvia
Auli Rautiainen / Finland
Peeter Rudaš / Estonia
Anders Ruhwald / Denmark
Jose Bernardo Sappia / Mexico
Peteris Sidars / Latvia
Beata Sietinšiene / Lithuania
Agnese Stage / Latvia
Oskars Stagis / Latvia
Adolfas Šaulys / Estonia
Silvia Zotta / Italy
Riitta Helena Talonpoika / Finland
Anne Thorning / Denmark
Ivana Tinkova / Czech
Kaja Tooming / Estonia
Kari Ulleberg / Norway
Vita Valdmane / Latvia
Piret Valk / Estonia
Vesa Kaleva Varrela / Finland
Kadri Viires / Estonia