Eesti kunsti oksjonid

Mixed media, oil on canvas. 2003.
Signature: MRoosvalt 2003 / MARI ROOSVALT KOHT IV 2003 segat. oli l. 45 x 100

Mari Roosvalt (b. 1945), who established herself as a firm fixture in Estonian abstractionism in the early 2000s, has cited the world-famous Robert Rauschenberg as her main influence whom she also met in person in the 1980s. Like him, Roosvalt combines different media in her work, for example, cutouts and photo fragments with oil painting.

“Place IV” is part of a mini-series that deals with the mythology of places and genius loci through space and gives them a certain generalized anonymity through the titles. In this way, Roosvalt leaves the viewer the opportunity to relate to a place that is important to him or her through the paintings.

Thus, playing with a fragment of a nostalgic corner of a room, Roosvalt presents herself as a conceptualist. She uses the spaces only as hints, focusing primarily on the picturesque expressive possibilities of color. The brown-toned spatial views projected onto a blue-and-white background have the effect of memories of times gone by – of each person’s own moment somewhere deep in their heart, there by the sea, with dear people.

The work is reproduced in the book “Mari Roosvalt’s Paintings 1970-2006”.

Text: Harry Liivrand, Katre Palm