21.06-14.07.2024

Exhibition curated by Ramiro Camelo / Näyttelyn on kuratoinut Ramiro Camelo

Opening / Avajaiset 20.6.2024 18-20:00

Artist talk 21.06 17:00. Saskia Järve will be in conversation with curator Ramiro Camelo.

Myymälä2 is pleased to present “Thirst for Beauty” (ILUJANU) by the artist Saskia Järve. The exhibition marks her first solo show outside Estonia. Järve’s painting exhibition tells about the transience of poetic spiritual perception of the world, reverence for life and dreams about the force of life.

The project started in Italy in the summer of 2023 when the artist was in residence in Mazzano Romano and often travelled to Rome. It was a certain longing that took her to Italy, a “Thirst for Beauty”, as the title of the exhibition says, a thirst for something tangible and at the same time vague, which seems to be floating somewhere in the air, simultaneously perceptible and elusive; the need to escape into the world of feelings and senses where the shadows of the past and old buildings, gods and goddesses come back to life, where flowers and fruit trees smell sweetly, birds can be heard chirping and flapping their wings, and where time flows of its own accord.

Järve displays large-scale oil paintings alongside an installation of six paintings, titled “Sun Worshipers”. In her hypnotic cool-coloured paintings, bodies that need charging and fully charged bodies meet, as do souls, both empty and full. These works reflect the view that unfortunately we do not ourselves always perceive the most beautiful and remarkable aspects of who we are and what our lives could be, but we all yearn for beauty and an all-round existence.

The sun, together with blazing light, rose from behind the trees towering above the valley, the cats in their soft fur coats sneaked closer to me and flashed their green eyes, the ladies smoked lazily, occasionally sipping their coal-black aromatic coffee, in the hot city the church walls offered some cool for the tourists of the whole world…

Artist bio:
Saskia Järve, born 1979 in Pärnu, lives and works in Tallinn. She received her MA in Painting at the Estonian Academy of Arts in 2009. As a figurative painter, she depicts everyday events focusing on the complexity and psychology of human nature. Her practice combines frames from her personal life with figures and stories that originate in folklore and popular culture, and come across as something both familiar and strange.

Recent solo exhibitions include: “Celebration of Being”, Artrovert Gallery, Tallinn (2023); “Cold Front”, a collaboration with Kai Grehn, Vaal Gallery, Tallinn (2021); “Remember Me”, a collaboration with Maria Lapteva Sidljarevitš, Hop Gallery, Tallinn (2019); “Invisibles”, Draakon Gallery, Tallinn (2018); “Memory Fades II”, City Gallery, Tallinn (2017) and “Memory Fades”, Toompea Castle Art Hall, Tallinn (2016).

Recent group exhibitions include: “VALGE LAEV – DET VITA SKEPPET”, exhibition of the Estonian Painters’ Association, Estonian House Stockholm, Stockholm (2023); “Spring Exhibition 2022”, The 22nd Annual Exhibition of Estonian Artists’ Association, Tallinn Art Hall, Tallinn (2022); “The Sea”, exhibition of the Estonian Painters’ Association, HAA Europe project, Malmitalo Gallery, Helsinki (2022); “17th International Vilnius Painting Triennial
(UN)DETERMINED”, Museum of Applied Arts and Design, Smoke Factory, Vilnius (2020-2021) and “Haihatus International 7”, Taidelaitos Haihatus, Joutsa (2018).

“Thirst for Beauty” (ILUJANU) is part of Myymälä 2 “Baltic Fellowship Network” which aims to
potentiate collaboration and facilitate artistic exchanges among art institutions, exhibition
spaces, individuals and counterparts based in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

Special thanks to: Myymälä2, Ramiro Camelo, Henri Huberg and Eva Kolli.

The exhibition is financially supported by EESTI KULTUURKAPITAL -The Cultural Endowment of Estonia