Helga Jõerüüt 09.05.1925 Gursuff. 1975 - 1979

In the present auction choice works of three artists have been joined in the section “classics of the modern art”. Different artists, different meanings. When Helga Jõerüüt is telling us a story of an artist, who after having changed the profession still continues to deal with art and is able to find her way between different trends, then Olev Subbi is a painter par excellence – painting is his real thing. Valve Janov in her turn is an artist, who while having concentrated on painting, does not get tired of looking for the possibilities to renew it. But the fates of Subbi and Janov are also characteristic to the 20.century Estonia. Subbi was sent to exile and he received the possibility to study art only after eight years. Valve Janov belonged to the so-called Sooster group, where she together with other Tartu artists strove for art that could hardly have been called the official style.

Helga Jõerüüt is most probably the least known from the three names, being the person who has concentrated on such art, which gives joy to herself personally. Jõerüüt does not try to accomplish large works, which would require special technical solutions, discover new forms or philosophize in depths. Jõerüüt is such type of artist, for whom creation in the first range means self-expression and only after that come art historical context and direction towards general public. Such artistic type mostly means direct reaction to the surroundings, light and sincere acceptance that allow first impressions to end up without especially thick filter also on the canvas or paper. “Gursuff” is another example of the obligation of artists to find “foreign countries” from other Soviet republics. Jõerüüt’s “Gursuff” steps next to the views of the Crimea by Kits and South-East Asia by Malin. As a direct impression, Jõerüüt brings in the first range in front of us colours, exotic and strange ones. From her works one should not try to look for complicated solutions or avant-garde approaches, as they are not the aim of Jõerüüt. But when we are looking in the modern art for the human touch, for a direct contact with the depicted objects and working in the name of art, not art history, then it is “Gursuff” we should have a look at.