Photo by Kristina Ollek
Opening of the Estonian pavillion in Venice
The most in-demand artist today These days, people call Katja Novitskova ‘the comet in the local arts sky’ and ‘the world artist from Lasnamäe’. Those are just some of the titles the Estonian press has used to refer to Novitskova since she skyrocketed into the international arts scene in recent years. There is no other Estonian artist whose exhibition at the Venice Biennale has attracted so much attention from international arts press. The Estonian exhibition made it to many must-see lists, including Huffington Post, Cura Magazine, Artforum, Artnews, and Dazed magazine. The extraordinary interest in Novitskova is demonstrated by the fact that the minute she was chosen as the Estonian representative at the 57th Venice Arts Biennale, one of the most read international arts portals – Artnet News – translated the Estonian press release into English, probably with the help of Google Translate, including a Facebook photo of Katja Novitskova together with curator Kati Ilves and the catbomb, which Ilves had posted to her friends. Katja Novitskova grew up in Lasnamäe, a Tallinn suburb with Soviet block housing which is home to the majority of the Russian-speaking
population in the capital. She went to an Estonian Russian-language school and from there to study at the Department of Semiotics at the University of Tartu. Later Novitskova studied graphic design in Amsterdam and, after graduating from there, began her career as an independent artist. In 2011, she published the book Post Internet Survival Guide 2010, which became part of art history as a manifesto of post-internet art. In 2017, the book has become almost impossible to find – its price starting from approximately 900 Euro on Amazon. The artist herself is represented by two galleries: Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler in Berlin and Greene Naftali in New York. Her works have been exhibited at various reputable arts shows, for example the Berlin Biennale in 2016 or New York MoMA and the 57th Venice Biennale. Last year she was ranked as one of the top 50 most interesting artists in Europe. Until November, Katja Novitskova’s sculpture exhibition ‘Earth Potential’ will be open at New York City Hall Park. Her Estonian Pavilion exhibit ‘If Only You Could See What I’ve Seen with Your Eyes’ will be open until 26 November in Venice at Palazzo Malipiero. Katja Novitskova’s work is also exhibited at the contemporary art exhibition ARS’17 in Kiasma, Helsinki. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 4 6
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