Aleksander Pilar 1912–1989 View of Tallinn. 1951

Although the art of Soviet Estonia was expected to depict a new, modern city, which has begun to be reorganized according to the demands, artists often still delved into the views of the slum and the old town. Their temporal definition is eternal, because the work could just as well have been painted a few decades earlier or later. Pilar connects the two city zones into a single whole and also sprinkles people between the zones, which makes the milieu much more lively. Thanks to the watercolor technique, Pilar moves away from concreteness and, especially in the depiction of the sky, is able to convey the atmosphere of early winter.