EXHIBITION // In Times When Everything Else Seems More Important

In Times When Everything Else Seems More Important
Eike Eplik
Curated by Šelda Puķīte
23.5.2025 — 9.8.2025

OPENING
On 23 May at 18.00 at Kogo Gallery

In times when ongoing wars and a growing political thirst for ultimate power hidden behind slogans of order have introduced a permanent state of instability, indulging in a search for one’s own inner child might seem senseless and even irresponsible. Anarchism, chaos, escapism – all these words ring the bells of doom in the feverish minds of adults trying to keep their fragile lives in order while the rest of the world is on fire. Hundreds of daily chores that keep the productivity numbers up give a sense of control and the idea that important things are being done and the purpose of one’s existence as a dutiful human being is fulfilled. But, to use the words of American writer Ursula Le Guin, one can say that people who deny the existence of dragons are often eaten by dragons. As somebody who sees the entrapment in this vicious coping mechanism as a one-way ticket to burnout, artist Eike Eplik disobeys and surrenders to creative chaos, offering her new exhibition as the platform for an intuitive, even visceral exploration of oneself.

Eplik’s solo exhibition is a playground for exhausted grown-ups who have forgotten the transformative effects and freedoms that a childlike openness and curiosity can present. Through playful rediscovery of one’s natural and youthful self, she questions the limitations and lack of imagination that the world of reason presents. Becoming a mother and observing her child’s free-spirited engagement with the world awakened in Eplik an urge to seek the same unapologetic courage to explore and nurture her inner child. In its own way, this project is a return to Eplik’s childhood world in the countryside near Rapla. This was a place where your fantasy could create and explore different worlds, and neither the space nor the body would suffer from limits built by rules. The closet could become a nightclub, and the outdoors, an extension of one’s body, melting together with mud or forest.

Read the rest of the curatorial text: https://www.kogogallery.ee/.../in-times-when-everything.../

The exhibition is part of our this year’s programme Thrifters and Transformers.

Eike Eplik (b. 1982) is a sculptor and installation artist based in Tartu. She creates sensitive and imaginative works full of personal mythology through different visual expressions and materials such as clay, plaster, metal, wood and ready-made. She holds an MA from the Sculpture Department at the Estonian Academy of Arts and a BA from the Sculpture Department at Tartu Art College. Eplik’s recent exhibitions include White Dwarfs and All Those Beautiful Nebulas at Kim? Contemporary Art Centre in Riga (2024), Down In The Bog – Sporulation at EKKM in Tallinn (2024), Emotional Landscapes at Arka Gallery in Vilnius (2023), Growing Out? Growing Up? Contemporary Art Collecting in the Baltics at Zuzeum Art Centre, Riga, Latvia (2022); My Bitter Sweet Frankenstein Body at Titanik, Turku, Finland (2022); Shared Territory at Tartu Art Museum, Tartu, Estonia (2021). In 2025, her works were presented at the contemporary art fair Esther II in New York and in 2021 at Liste Art Fair Basel. Eplik is a recipient of the Annual Prize of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia and several other awards, and was one of the recipients of Estonia’s national artist’s salary from 2021 to 2023. She is represented by Kogo Gallery.

Šelda Puķīte (b. 1986) is a Latvian curator, writer and researcher based in Estonia. Her formal education includes a Master’s and a Bachelor’s degree from the Department of Art History and Theory at the Art Academy of Latvia. She has worked on several international exhibitions, curated stands for art fairs including Liste Art Fair Basel, viennacontemporary and Art Brussels, published art albums, created catalogues for contemporary art festivals Survival Kit and Riga Photography Biennial, as well as written several essays for Baltic culture publications. Her most recent curated exhibitions include Eike Eplik’s solo exhibition In Times When Everything Else Seems More Important (2025) at Kogo Gallery, Tartu, Silver Girls. Retouched History of Baltic Photography(2025) together with Agnė Narušytė and Indrek Grigor at National Gallery of Art, Vilnius, and White Dwarfs and All Those Beautiful Nebulas (2024) at Kim? Contemporary Art Centre, Riga. Since 2020, she works at Kogo Gallery as an international project manager and exhibition programme curator.
The exhibition is funded by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia and the City of Tartu.

Kogo Gallery
Kastani 42, Tartu
Wed–Fri 12–18, Sat 12–16
www.kogogallery.ee/en/