EXHIBITION // Water is an Eternal Witness. Colour Indigo

Water is an Eternal Witness. Colour Indigo
Kristi Kongi
17.5.2024 — 3.8.2024
We open the exhibition Water is an Eternal Witness. Colour Indigo on 17 May at 18.00 at Kogo Gallery.
In the depths of the internet, one can find plenty of random videos that capture natural disasters. One such video shows an indoor swimming pool full of water standing still as if waiting for something. Suddenly, bigger and bigger waves start to build until a huge one pushes the water body out of the pool, taking over the rest of the space. While this dramatic scene was originally caused by a sudden earthquake, the turbulence in nature that caused this great spectacle can also serve as a visual metaphor for the mind’s changing from a state of calm to one of agitation. In her latest solo exhibition at Kogo Gallery, Kristi Kongi uses water as a strong poetical symbol to explore the beautiful fragility of complex emotions and builds an imaginative world in the form of aquatic landscapes.

Like water, Kongi’s artistic approach can be described as fluid and in constant motion. The motives and compositions float and develop instead of rapidly changing. Her sight is fixed on certain horizons, which she studies with the help of light, colour and shadow-like forms. Some landscapes emerge as patterns and grids born from observations of urbanistic sites, others as subtle colour gradients found in the sky. This time, her gaze is turned toward the water, which has become a source of her observations during her frequent swims. When the sun pierces through the water to make it particularly transparent, Kongi sees what she describes as windows. A certain world starts to form in her mind, and she carries this to her studio, where it reappears on her canvas.
Water is an Eternal Witness. Colour Indigo imaginatively transports the underwater realm to the surface, where visitors can enter and dive into Kongi’s world. One can drown in anxiety to only later resurface and find the way out. It is a therapeutic process for the artist that has the potential to become a collective healing.


The exhibition is part of Kogo Gallery’s this year’s programme Performing Existence. The gallery’s programme is designed to capture a certain vibe that embodies the emotional undertone of the events and questions topical in that particular moment and which define the contemporary zeitgeist. This year we are also in dialogue with the European Capital of Culture Tartu 2024 which carries the title Arts of Survival. The gallery’s previous exhibition programmes have been titled Ecology–Economy (2021), Past is the Present (2022), Queer It Up (2023).
Read more about the exhibition: https://www.kogogallery.ee/.../the-water-is-an-eternal.../
The exhibition is funded by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia and the City of Tartu.
Special thanks to Caparol Eesti and Tanker Brewery.


Kogo Gallery
Kastani 42, Tartu
Wed–Fri at 12.00–18.00, Sat at 12.00–16.00
https://www.kogogallery.ee/en/