Six figures Kris Lemsalu

Do you know the tale where a person falls in love with an Edelweiss flower? The one that Moondog sings about–the musician spots an Edelweiss flower growing high up on a mountain cliff and becomes completely enamoured by it. He must jump to his death from the ledge to be together with his flower. At least that’s what the bird on his head says.

Beside him is Swantrack, who is singing a different song. Or at least waiting to do so because they want to capture the end. They find it the most beautiful–the grace of the final bow, the realisation that the last flower on the ledge is indeed the most wonderful. It’s where everything else ceases to exist, when there’s no track forth or back.

Back Home, who is creeping in the corner, and who we often forget about. Too busy imagining the end, or life filled with love. Home is safe and calm. Like a sanctuary. But unlike a house made of bricks, this one is rooted and living. Guarding inside, there’s an owl, who stays awake while the world is asleep. When the swan has sung.

Venus can’t sit still. They don’t care about Moondog’s Edelweiss nor the swan song. Too abstract! They’re here to put some effort in, to work for their ideas, which haven’t yet hatched, though. Venus is literally covered in them. They’re its love and under the heaviest of armours. And the happiest.

While a unicorn is traditionally a symbol of rare, singular wonder, the pitless eyes of this one suggest that something has been hollowed out. Or deepened? Nevertheless, Uniqlo is the prettiest of the figures, commanding your eyes with its purity and intensity. Its horn, similar in colour to the eternal owl, is believed to have the power to purify poisoned water. It could even heal Moondog.

Lastly, we have the Enigma, smiling under a moss hat as if it hasn’t read the room. It is either a paradox in disguise or a sign that everyone else is simply trying too hard. It acts as the ‘flaw’ that brings all others into question—the mutation, the stranger, or the break. Like the moment where the pattern fails and something new begins to bloom.

— Gregor Kulla

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Kris Lemsalu is a contemporary artist based in Tallinn, Estonia, and Vienna, Austria. She studied at the Estonian Academy of Arts, the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, and the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. Eccentric in her use of color and materials, Lemsalu incorporates props, costumes, and natural elements to create immersive installations that, in her words, “give birth to a world of shamanic force, visionary weirdness, and collective revival.” 

Kris Lemsalu has exhibited work at 58th Venice Biennial, Italy; KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Germany; and Secession, Austria, among others.