Anu Pennanen

The works of Anu Pennanen disconnect themselves from any focus on individuality, whether on the skin or inside the head. Her works are about our relationship with society and the public. Many of them take architecture and the urban space as their motif—a physical, yet abstract and constantly changing zone that also serves as an arena for social relations and communication.

In the works Sõprus—Дружа (Friendship) and You Don’t Realize It Used to Be Different, young people seize the urban space on their own terms, testing their limits and boundaries. The groups come from different ethnic backgrounds—Estonian and Russian. The site is Tallinn, mostly its new shopping center, which reflects both the current state and the future of Estonia. The immediate past is represented by concrete monumental architecture reflecting Soviet utopias. The idyllic Old Town, central to the tourist perspective, also makes an appearance but mostly remains in the background. Against the green of the shrubbery, lawns, and wasteland areas, the young people seem at their most natural, their cheeks ruddy with youth; inside them the gate is still open to a moment from childhood, from original existence. The urban space has special significance for young people: It is exciting and unknown. It stands for the future, for freedom, for severing ties with home and becoming independent.

Both works were preceded by lengthy discussions with the young protagonists to find out about their lives and their thoughts on the city. The setting in the works is the youths’ authentic environment, but the events have been scripted. Pennanen’s narrative is based on realism and resembles the documentary idiom, although the works are ultimately fiction. This creates an exciting overlap of layers that are similar yet distinct, in which the natural mixes with the distanced. The youths are acting but playing themselves.

The works are anchored in the social context, time, and place. They depict a certain shift in the history of Estonia but have an eternal, timeless aspect as well. Friendship is a classic theme, albeit one that is not often explored in contemporary art. One could just as easily point out the changes taking place in Tallinn due to the rapid development of the city center, or how identity is formed and polished through friendship, trust, respect, and social responsibility. One central theme is youth, which is perhaps more coveted, prolonged, and worshipped than ever before. Youth as portrayed by Pennanen is not something raised on a pedestal. It is, however, real youth—full of uncertainties, aimless roaming of streets, open possibilities, the illusion of freedom, and accidental occurrences.

Pennanen investigates humanity as social, extroverted, and constructive. Prejudices can be overcome; encountering others is something valuable; strangers can become friends. The works convey a positive attitude, a belief that the young people hanging out in the shopping center are thinking about the future, are concerned about it, and want to build a tomorrow. Youth can be a short period of transition between childhood and adulthood. Alternatively, it can continue for decades. Compared to the history of a city, the span of human life is poignantly short. One generation can cause irreversible changes to our environment. But the city with its layers and structures—sharing things as well as responsibilities—places the individual in the context of a larger whole, as part of a chain of generations. Partly alongside the old, partly out of the ruins and ashes, the possibility of something new and better has always materialized.

Henna Paunu