Kalevipoeg from Stockholm
	Eero Epner

	Recent years have seen a number of researches in Estonian art history, tackling the life of Estonian artists during and after WWII. Although they are scholarly articles, they contain general human issues. After all, cultural figures should, at least in the opinion of some, constitute the ethical backbone of a nation. What was their reaction to the occupations and the war? Did they resist or did they collaborate? If the former, then how; and if the latter, why? It is occasionally easy to judge, such as when an artist’s activities were unambiguous – as in the case of Andrus Johani and Kaarel Liimand (see Heie Treier’s article on pages 32–33), both analysed in the current issue, who openly collaborated with the soviet occupation. More frequently, however, artists avoided interference by continuing to paint neutral landscapes. By not taking a stand they chose the least unsavoury option from an unpalatable menu of choices. Namely these choices did not allow the birth of an Estonian Guernica or Estonian rebel art. At the same time, these choices do not merely interest us from an historical point of view, but pose a most banal, but potentially embarrassing question: what would I have done? By the start of WWII, Kristjan Raud was over 70, his work was largely done (including illustrating the symbolically loaded national epic Kalevipoeg) and a little house in the outskirts of the capital provided the well-deserved rest. He was considered the lighthouse of Estonian ‘national’ art whose archaic topics, angular lines and rough simplicity the wider public seem to automatically associate with the ‘Estonian spirit’. One might therefore expect that such compositions would have produced expressive eruptions during such difficult times. However, regarding just the external aspect of Raud’s works, no drastic changes occurred. Instead, in the suburbian calm he continued with his familiar topics and approaches. And this continuation itself became eloquent. Estonian culture, characterised as something that constantly disrupts, had found an artist in Raud who went on uninterrupted, and found its meaning in that very continuation. No wonder then that his activities of the time later created various semi-legends. For example the romantic story about the work Kalevipoeg on His Father’s Grave, allegedly completed by Raud when he was seriously ill in hospital. This was supposed to be one of the new (!) illustrations of Kalevipoeg, where the skies are turned inside out and the national hero stands at his father’s grave. It is significant – and typical – of 20th century Estonia that this work was found, almost by chance, in a home of an exiled Estonian living in Stockholm. The person in question was a passionate collector and had taken his art collection with him when he left his country for good. When WWII was over, art life gradually returned. In conditions of the strictest control, the first large exhibition displayed the works of none other than Kristjan Raud. The museum staff reputedly wore national costumes at the opening of the exhibition... Eero Epner (1978), art critic, dramaturge at Theatre NO99
	| Estonian Art 2/06 (19) | Published by the Estonian Institute 2006 | ISSN 1406-5711 (Online) | ISSN 1406-3549 (Printed version) | einst@einst.ee | tel: (372) 631 43 55 | fax: (372) 631 43 56 |