GRAM PROM 2022: exhibition programme

Tallinn Art Hall is pleased to present GRAM PROM 2022, its annual programme announcement.

Current exhibition
...and Other Shades of Light. Kristi Kongi and Krista Mölder
Curator: Siim Preiman
Until March 6, 2022
Digital guide

...and Other Shades of Light brings together artists Kristi Kongi (b. 1985) and Krista Mölder (b. 1972). The exhibition creates a unique constellation by combining each artists’ work, in which light plays an important role. 

“Colours, their flicker, variability and sensual influence play important roles in the work of both artists, with one of them preferring unworldly vibrant colours, while the other favouring subdued Nordic tones,” says Siim Preiman, the curator of the exhibition. “The trail of thought of both artists begins with a spatial experience. They can both create immersive art spaces, as well as flat hanging rectangular objects. Each visitor can decide for themselves whether this get-together is pleasantly harmonious or excitingly dissonant.”

We’ll Be Right Back, You Just Keep Playing
Curator: Tamara Luuk
March 19–June 5, 2022

Beginning summer 2022, Tallinn Art Hall will undergo a major building renovation during which they will move from Freedom Square to Lasnamäe. Setting a hopeful tone, the last exhibition in the space before works commence is titled, We’ll Be Right Back. You Just Keep Playing.

How much play is there in Estonian art? At first glance, perhaps not much. Look more closely and you will find playfulness not only in its subject, but also in its form and development—lines, colours, and volumes. 

Lasnamäe Pavilion


The Spring Exhibition: The 22nd Annual Exhibition of the Estonian Artists’ Association 
June 4–August 14, 2022

Tallinn Art Hall will open the doors of their temporary exhibition pavilion next to the Lindakivi Centre in Lasnamäe with the traditional annual Spring Exhibition of the Estonian Artists’ Association. All artists operating in Estonia are welcomed to submit work completed in 2021 and 2022. The new exhibition venue in Lasnamäe will offer a courtyard in which outdoor sculpture can be exhibited. The jury will select approximately 70 artists to participate. You can view information about the members of the jury and exhibition design here. 

Each year, the public can vote for their favourite artist. The winner receives 5,000 EUR from art sponsors.

Oliver Ressler: Barricading the Ice Sheets
Curator: Corina L. Apostol
August 27–November 6, 2022

Barricading the Ice Sheets investigates global warming, the climate justice movement, and the relation of the latter to the arts. The title refers to the scale of the emergency the climate justice movement faces and the scope of what it sets out to do. It is physically impossible to barricade ice sheets as they melt, but the movement is attempting something historically unprecedented.

For the exhibition Ressler has recorded and documented some exemplary mobilisations, activities, assemblies, and work meetings of the climate movements. There is no “neutral” position from which we could merely document a social movement. Every decision – concerning how and what to record and what to omit, or what to include/exclude when editing the direct quotes of the activists – must be recognised as simultaneously conditioned by and constitutive of the relation to that movement. Consequently, the artistic production drawn from Oliver Ressler’s research will include material that might momentarily be seen as straightforwardly “documentary”, along with other elements where the “artistic” engagement is more obvious. Any sustained attention to the work, however, will reveal its systematic blurring of any artificial line between “documentation” and “artwork”.

Is There Hope for Lovely Creatures?
Curator: Tamara Luuk
November 26, 2022–February 5, 2023

Is There Hope for Lovely Creatures? is an exhibition about women, but also a little bit about men. About women against the background of men and men against the background of women in our present time. It is inspired by Alexei Gordin’s 2013 videos, No More Hope for Lovely Creatures and What Junkie Dreamed of Before His Death. Participating artists include Maria Sidljarevich, Vassa Ponomarjova, Anu Põder, Alice Kask, Merike Estna, Jevgeni Zolotko, among others.

Art Hall Gallery


Runner Along the Border, Rat Catcher and Bricklayer
Curator: Gregor Taul
February 5–April 3, 2022

The departure point for this exhibition is short stories by Peet Vallak, Mehis Heinsaar and Ilmar Külvet. It brings together Baltic artists of different generations each dealing with border and identity issues: Amie Nga Man Chan, Eike Eplik, Kristaps Epners, Hanna Samoson and Augustas Serapinas.

Tallinn City Gallery

August Künnapu and Evi Tihemets
Happiness and Everything Else (working title)
Curator: Tamara Luuk
May 5–July 3, 2022

Evi Tihemets was at the forefront of Estonian print art in its heyday. Now approaching 90, her playful style still displays a curiosity and desire for experimentation. Tihemets’ large-scale, forceful print art and small brightly coloured paintings from the early 1960s proudly align with August Künnapu’s real-life scenes painted in sharp colour segments. The works of both artists are both painterly and print-like at the same time.

Cloe Jancis
Wishing Well
Curator: Siim Preiman
July 8–September 4, 2022

For thousands of years, people have been talking about the source of eternal youth and wishing wells. One by one, blank unexplored patches have disappeared from the world map, but no such source or well has been found anywhere. The indelible thirst of people for eternal youth and beauty has not yet been quenched. Jancis’ forthcoming exhibition draws inspiration from the influx of commodified self-help opportunities on social media, fetishizing positivity and happiness, as though other human emotions are not worth feeling.

From Dream Sequences to Real-Life Consequences
Curator: Keiu Krikmann
September 9–November 6, 2022

From Dream Sequences to Real-Life Consequences focuses on material-based art and on material as a tool of creating new imaginaries. It looks at material also as a carrier of memory and at the eclectic permutations that occur within the process of reconstructing past either for archival purposes or for envisioning futures. However, as these dreams begin to materialise, they are confronted by the very real disintegrating material conditions of the contemporary world. The exhibition proposes material as a source of fiction and for fiction, entwining it with a variety of other media, such as text, performance, and video. 

Bad Ideas
Curator: Bad Ideas Collective
November 11, 2022–January 15, 2023

Bad Ideas Collective presents short videos by individual artists and collaborators without direct authorial attribution. The works address the internal discourses and decision-making involved in the creative process, shifting audience engagement away from questions of production and ownership. The emphasis is on the candid disclosure of the play and processing of ideas – how they are evaluated and either used or abandoned in art practice.

Launched in December 2020, Bad Ideas Collective is an ongoing, online project. 

For international press inquiries relating to Tallinn Art Hall’s programme, please contact Alexia Menikou, am@alexiamenikou.com