January 23rd-29th 2011
Art Container The Bathers. Performance documentation in 3D.

Closing reception: Sat 29th 7-10pm

 The Bathers is a social and architectural experiment. The working sauna is built of used windows.It enables literally to look into Estonian sauna culture. Every bather in the sauna is a performer. The sauna serves both as a stage and at the same times as a whole small theatre house.

The sauna is open for the public, but there are 7 permanent performers inside the sauna throughout the  event. The borderline between the audience and actors is completely blurred. The performance could be viewed both from outside, thanks to the transparency of windows and from inside the sauna. Estonian traditional sauna customs are practiced by performers: sitting a very hot room, throwing water to the oven, thus raising the temperature inside, hitting oneself with the dried branches, socializing with each other, telling stories.

So far The Bathers has been performed in Polymer Culture Factory in Tallinn, Estonia (July-August 2009), Balta Nakts festival in Riga, Latvia (September 2009), Fountain Art Fair, Miami, USA (December 2009) and Brisbane Festival in Australia(September 2010).

"The Bathers. Performance documentation in 3D" fetaures The Bathers the interactive performance/installation as a small scale model.

Art Container is a small group of people running together the shared studio space, a residency and an independent art gallery in Culture Factory Polymer in Tallinn, Estonia since 2008. They have exhibited and performed together since the end of 2008 in Tallinn, Estonia, Riga, Latvia, Miami, USA and Brisbane, Australia.

Tanel Saar (1979) is an Estonian artist mostly focused in performance and installation art. He has graduated from Estonian Academy of Arts and has studied in Finnish Academy of Fine Arts. He has exhibited and performed in USA, Korea, Chile, Canada and many European countries. Tanel Saar was an active member of the Estonian artist group Non Grata in 1998-2008, touring, performing and exhibiting with the group constantly. Presently he is giving workshops of performance art at the performing arts` faculty in Estonian Academy of Arts, specializing in teaching the durational performances. He also does run the series of durational performances in Art Container gallery, beginning in October 2008 in collaboration with the UK-based art group called ProtoPLAY.
Tanel Saar has been running the independent art space Art Container in Culture Factory Polymer in Tallinn, together with Sandra Jogeva and Erik Alalooga Estonia since April 2007. He is also in board of directors of Culture Factory Polymer.
Tanel Saar`s latest solo art works include an installation titled Trojan Horse in Art
Container gallery in February 2010 and an installation containing of a small copy of the Non Grata headquarters in Parnu, Estonia, a large fish tank and two living piranhas in a Tallinn Art Hall group show titled Animal Collective in March 2009. He did also design the exposition for that show.

Sandra Jogeva (1976) is an Estonian artist, writer and a curator. She has been running the independent art space Art Container in Culture Factory Polymer together with Tanel Saar and Erik Alalooga since April 2007. She is a founding member of artist groups Avangard (2000-2006) and Pink Punk (2003-2007). Sandra Jogeva has performed and exhibited in USA, New Zealand and many European countries. She has published a collection of short stories in Estonian in 2008 and is constantly publishing art criticism and essays in Estonian press. Sandra Jogeva has won a Betti Alver prize for her debut in literature in 2009 and a prize of Estonian Endowment of Culture in 2004. Sandra Jogeva runs a series
of literature events in Art Container since the Summer of 2008. She has graduated from Estonian Academy of Arts, getting her BA in painting and MA in interdisciplinary arts. She has been recently working in the fields of sculpture and installation, creating the headless bodies of large women made out of gelatine and other objects made of silicone, latex and caramel, experimenting with different nontraditional materials. Her art has been associated with gender issues and she has used her real life experience as a dominatrix in her art works. Her most recent solo show was in a gallery called Grace Space in Brooklyn, New York in June 2009 and her recent curatorial projects include an international group show titled Animal Collective in Tallinn Art Hall in March 2009 and New Age in Parnu Artists` House in March 2010.

Erik Alalooga (1974) is an Estonian artist and a teacher. Erik Alalooga is a professor in Estonian Academy of Arts in performing arts department since 2006. Erik Alalooga has graduated from Estonian Academy of Arts, getting his BA in sculpture and MA in interdisciplinary arts. He has been running the independent art space Art Container in Culture Factory Polymer together with Tanel Saar and Sandra Jogeva since March 2007. During the past several years Erik Alalooga`s solo art projects have been all about creating Kinematic Mysteriums as he calls them: labour-intense interactive installations of rustic looking welded objects with performative elements. The audience always has
to actively participate and collaborate with each other to make the event happen. In a way, they have to “solve the mysteries”. He has exhibited his mysteriums so far in Estonia, Lithuania, France and Austria. Prior to Mysteriums Erik Alalooga has created complex kinetic objects that also require heavy participation from viewers to become interactive with the audience. His Mysteriums, however, are on their way to become even more performative and avant-garde theatre-like and less of the passive “art” objects that belong to a gallery space. Recently Erik Alalooga has started a collaboration with Estonian-based German contemporary composer Hans-Günther Lock, who provides the Mysteriums with experimental musical background.

Mai Sööt was born in 1983 in Tartu. In 2007 she graduated painting and restoration in Tartu Art College. In addition she studied in Kaunas Art Institute as exchange student. Thereupon entered painting department at Estonian Academy of Arts MA. After changing specialty graduated interdisciplinary arts in 2010.
Mai Sööt has been working with painting, sculpture, video, installation. Presently she is creating performances, where sculptures act as substantial attributes.

She is working with topics of mundane and clerical, embarrassing and sacral, making sincerity to grow into self-irony and the opposite.