Eesti kunsti oksjonid

Oil on canvas. 1979.
Signature: TP 79. / T. Pääsuke “Part” õ. l. 1979. 6. okt. 1979. T. Pääsuke

“For as long as I can remember, from my grandparents’ home in Viljandi, nature has had a special influence on me, one that has grown over the years. Forests, swamps, bogs, riverbanks, expected and always unexpected encounters with wild animals and birds – colors, sounds, smells,” says Tiit Pääsuke (Maire Toom “Painter par Excellence”, 2000).

The motif of grass, reeds, and hay entered his paintings in 1974, when he painted a landscape in the Raudna River valley below Heimtal. It was during this period that some of Pääsuke’s most iconic pieces were completed, including “Duck” from 1979, which belongs to the same series as the paintings “Silver Gull” (1975, KUMU), “Grass Blooms” (1976, private collection), and “Landscape with a Car” (1976, KUMU). While “Silver Gull” refers more clearly to environmental pollution (asphalt paint flowing onto the painting from the left and a bird in a birdhouse), “Duck” depicts a bird that has quietly taken refuge in a reed bed.

The work of the great Estonian painter is prone to poetic allegories and surrealist parables, and here too he speaks of the cry for help from nature and its inhabitants for harmonious coexistence. However, the important message is beautifully illustrated by the range of colors, where silver, brown, green and blue tones form a harmonious whole. A male bird in colorful plumage amidst coastal plants acts here as a symbolic bird for the unpretentious beauty of nature.

Text: Katre Palm, Harry Liivrand, Tiit Pääsuke