Base (I)

Four years ago, Jevgeni Zolotko exhibited his installation Base at the Noorus Gallery in Tartu. It includes a discarded Orthodox iconostasis, with the icons removed, the royal gates boarded up and Pantocrator Christ gone. In front of the iconostasis there are three analogia lecterns with tilted tops (from where “the word” is proclaimed) carrying video screens. On the middle screen, a dead-drunk father, asserting his dignity with curse words, is forcing his frightened young son to drive them home. The noisy flow of speech and self-justification of the father contrasts with the forced readiness for action of the son, for which it is impossible to hold him to account. As in Farkas’ works, here too imperfection becomes amplified, although the aesthetic sensitivity used to express it calls for the unrefined nudity of raw sincerity.