Jette Loona Hermanis’s performance Endling
Jette Loona Hermanis has been invited to interact with the exhibition “Through the Black Gorge of Your Eyes”, for which she has created a new work “Endling”, which deals with mortality and loneliness in a surreal apocalyptic environment.
The transcendence of Hermanis’ work and dealing with (own) mythologies creates an interesting parallel with the works in the exhibition, which were created in a completely different time and space. The performativity and approaches to different subjects present in the graphic works resonate well with the worlds created by Hermanis.
The story revolves around a creature named Endling, a lonely creature who is the last survivor of their species or sub-species, hence their death would mean the extinction of that species or sub-species. Endling expresses loneliness and yearns for companionship, creating situations that may satisfy their yearnings in an apocalyptically surreal environment.
Since the event has a limited audience number, please arrive in front of Kumu’s great hall with a little time to spare.
Jette Loona Hermanis of Estonian and Latvian descent is a performance artist, performer and choreographer. She graduated as a choreographer from the Amsterdam School for New Dance Development (SNDO). Her art is always accompanied by mystical transcendence or crossing the boundaries of experience, and there is a yearning to express affect. Strongly influenced by the digital era, her creative material strongly attempts to place itself at the centre and to reaffirm the online self-image by displaying emotional narratives of herself and existentialism. The storytelling format she uses – entwining an electronic soundtrack with a body – depicts hyperreal situations to which she can surrender.
The exhibition Through the Black Gorge of Your Eyes opens a new perspective on the oeuvre of Estonian women graphic artists who emerged in the second half of the 1960s. The contemporary performance artists Jette Loona Hermanis, Kaja Kann and Keithy Kuuspu have been invited to performatively relate to the artists and their works.
Format: solo performance, with some text in English
Duration: 1h
Concept, choreography, text and performance: Jette Loona Hermanis
Scenography elements and promotional visuals: Matiss Rucko
Costume: Kirke Talu
Sound mixing: Jette Loona Hermanis
Light: Sasha Mirson
Scenography elements and promotional visuals: Matiss Rucko
Costume: Kirke Talu
Sound mixing: Jette Loona Hermanis
Light: Sasha Mirson
Voice modulation: Jakob Tulve
Thanks to: Michael Fowler, Andres Mirme, Enar Tarmo