PRESS RELEASE

MARI ROOSVALT's (1945) personal exhibition Sketchbook will be open in Draakon gallery since the afternoon of December 15, 2014. Finissage of the exhibition with the presence of the artist will take place on Thursday, January 8, 2015 at 5pm.

Mari Roosvalt graduated from the department of painting at the Estonian State Art Institute in 1969 and worked as an art teacher in Tallinn Secondary School No. 7, Tallinn Secondary School No. 46, Tallinn Art School and Tallinn Pedagogical University. Since 1992, Mari Roosvalt has held various positions at the Estonian Academy of Arts. The artist has actively taken part in exhibitions since 1970 and has been awarded with several reputable prizes, including the Konrad Mägi Award.

Current exhibition follows the manner of painting that the artist mastered in late 1990s when she started to complement her paintings with photographic pieces whereas in 1980s Roosvalt practised abstract painting and in 1990 she moved on with abstract expressionism.

According to the artist, present exposition Sketchbook is a compilation where she allows several masses of culture to flow through herself. Short-term impressions collected in the sketchbook will be recreated in another, more elaborate way at this exhibition. Roosvalt contradicts two subjects – ozone and play. Ozone is immediate, directly inspired by nature. The artist aims at staying on the playground of classical painting while compounding the enjoying, discoursive and visually contemplating approach. It is an expressive play with constant semantic changes characteristic to cities. Roosvalt injects different motifs and textures while adding new strata. To some extent, she tries to throw in objective and documenting medium – photography. The artist remains faithful to the tradition of abstract painting and to Romantic Modernist mentality.

Exhibition will be open until January 10, 2015.

Supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.

Exhibitions in Draakon gallery are supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia and Estonian Ministry of Culture.