Exhibitions

UPCOMING EXHIBITION

TALLINN

15.03 - 21.04.2024 "Feminisphere", Gallery Volta, Estonia. Curated by Lilian Hiob.

VILNIUS 29.08.2024
International art exhibition Under the Surface. Eroded Spacescapes 29.08.2024 – 29.09.2024, gallery “Arka”, Vilnius, Lithuania. Curated by Satu Kalliokuusi, Eeva Muona, Tiiu Rebane ja Evelina Januškaitė.

PREVIOUS EXHIBITIONS

Group exhibition "Feminisphere" at Volta Gallery, Tallinn, Estonia, March 2024. Part of the private collection of Kaupo Karelson, curated by Lilian Hiob.

The paintings by Katrin Valgemäe portray self-conscious women with an almost grotesque appearance.

Photo credit: Irene Marie Reisner and Roman-Sten Tõnissoo

Personal exhibition "QUEENS of CHAOS", Myymälä Gallery, Helsinki, 2023 December, curated by Ramiro Camelo.

Myymälä2 is pleased to present “Queens of Chaos” with brand new artworks by Estonian artist Katrin Valgemäe, the exhibition marks her first solo show outside Estonia. The main body of work is a series of kitschy stylistic paintings which are influenced both —with equal enthusiasm— by visual imagery shaped by watching Finnish TV advertising during her childhood and a fictional and sarcastic allegory on Estonian consumerism during the last decade of the Soviet occupation. Ultimately, the exhibitions try to connect different timelines, from the fake dreams of socialism to the rapturous 1990s in independent Estonia and the present.

The sophisticated look of Valgemäe’s women, or queens, clashes with their intention of promoting brands of almost banal commodities, “Felix”, “Kalev”, “Pedigree”, etc. However, one can think that the gorgeous visual imagery of Valgemäe’s wish to extend beyond their canvases. Somehow, it is not strange to think that Valgemäe’s burlesque portraits mixture of high and low depicting kooky, cheeky and coquettish women are topically affiliated with some of the endless shared awkwardly confessional selfied-mirrored promotional Tik-Toks videos.

The exhibition’s curator Ramiro Camelo, advises us to look Valgemäe’s canvases more scrupulously. He says: “What attracted me to Valgemäe paintings, from the very beginning, is that they are executed with a deliberate mannered flamboyance, which turns her style a bit whimsy and offbeat. In doing so she creates a weirdly blissful visual mood. I must insist don’t take her paintings at face value, Valgemäe’s pictorical manner is in fact both highly skilled and technically smarter than it may at first seem.”

The exhibition is financially supported by The Cultural Endowment of Estonia

Personal exhibition "Estonian Preacher", Castellan House Gallery, Tallinn, 2022 October.

Through a series of works, the exhibition "Estonian Preacher" explores the creative process of painting and the spiritual connection between the artist and color.

Group exhibition "Sea" HAA Gallery, Rantakasarmi, Suomenlinna, 2022 June.

"Never trust a guy in a bikini"

Personal exhibition “16 ROUND PRINCESSES”, Staapli Gallery, Tallinn, 2021 October.

Katrin Valgemäe’s, who is spicing up classical painting techniques with pop art, kitsch and camp, “16 ROUND PRINCESSES” is an illusion of Hans Christian Andersen’s fairytale “Princess Pea”, with which generations of women have grown up. The fairytale about a promised prince on a white horse and a "whipped cream cake” bridal gown slips into an astonishing potpourri of ironically gazing women who don't seem to know what to do with the upside down fairytale (ie reality). One might think that a new generation of self-conscious 21st-century "girls" imbued with feminism have put a short end to this fairytale, but the screen-sneer of the selfie era proves the exact opposite. Is the hypnotised self-perspective of contemporary exaggerated self-centredness a zombie like metamorphosis of a broken promise?