Johannes Säre ‘Ascent to the Abyss of Lost Ideas’
In his works Johannes Säre often questions the classical strategies of conceptual art and the self-assigned value of neo-conceptualism in contemporary art. Instead of relying on words and text, Säre’s space with a lit window awakens our bodies’ senses and enables in us the capability to receive a more primal experience. In 2014 this work was a nominee for the Köler Prize and won the public’s choice award.
Johannes Säre is a multidisciplinary artist with a background in photography. He was born in Tartu in 1983, completed his educational path in Tallinn at the Photography Department of the Estonian Academy of Arts. He belonged to JIM comprised of a group of photography students (Johannes Säre, Iti Kasser, and Maido Juss), which was established in 2007 and has now been disbanded. The group dealt with the cultivation of DIY-star-mythology in the classic post-modernist idiom and the production of anonymous pseudo-identities that are “hollow on the inside”.In Säre’s individual work, he has set out from a typical neo-conceptualist position, i.e. the ironic-playful recycling of the 20th century’s conceptualist artistic legacy (for example, the solo exhibition Rhizome in 2011 and Little House on the Periphery with Kristiina Hansen at the Hobusepea Gallery in 2012) and recently focused on the construction of minimalist theatrical spatial installations in solo and group exhibitions both in Estonia and internationally.