Mart Org. Exhibition "The Artist with Three Home Shores" at Pärnu Museum

21.09.2024 – 1.05.2025 at Pärnu Museum

"Mart Org: The Artist with Three Home Shores”

During the great wave of escape in 1944, an estimated 80,000 people left Estonia. Among them was nine-year-old Mart Org, who, together with his mother Leida Org, father Märt Org who was a lumber entrepreneur, and sister Mai, fled by fishing boat through Kihnu towards Sweden, with the glow from the bombing of Pärnu coloring the sky red in the background. Although Mart left as a schoolboy, the memories of Pärnu forever accompanied him. 

In Sweden, the little boy from Pärnu grew into an esteemed painter. Mart Org, who gained citizenship there in 1953, began his art studies at the Higher School of Applied Arts in Stockholm, specializing as a drawing teacher. In 1955, his education continued at Signe Barth's painting school. He then entered the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm, followed by active exhibition activities in Stockholm. 

Thanks to art scholarships, the young artist had the opportunity to explore the world outside Sweden. Summer painting trips to Italy became part of his creative process, where he got acquainted with the landscapes of Tuscany and Northern Italy, as well as the magnificent architecture and cultural heritage of Rome. Enchanted by Italy, the artist decided to acquire a house in Apricale. Thus began a 40-year life and creative period in the mountain village near the French border, which became an inexhaustible source of inspiration for Org, mainly known as a landscape and genre painter.

Mart Org divided his life among three countries – Estonia, Sweden, and Italy. In his work, the concepts of home and a sense of home were central themes. Org's art can be approached biographically: he loved to paint subjects close to his heart and people dear to him, as well as nuances inherent to different cultures that fascinated him.

Currently residing in Stockholm, the artist has not lost touch with his hometown of Pärnu, which holds a special place in his work. Mart Org captured the windows of his childhood home on Mihkli Street in his works, even years after leaving. In 2016, the artist exhibited collages inspired by his childhood home at Avangard Gallery, which he donated to the Pärnu Museum after the exhibition. That same year, the artist expressed a wish for his entire life's work to one day find a home in the Pärnu Museum's art collection. This summer, that wish came to fruition with the help of Avangard gallery owners Marian and Jan Leo Grau, and over two hundred works by Mart Org and his mother Leida Org were brought to the Pärnu Museum. The arrival of this extensive collection in Pärnu on the 80th anniversary of the great escape wave served as an impetus for this exhibition. 

In addition to Mart Org's paintings depicting the daily life of Sweden, Italy, and Pärnu, the exhibition will also feature textile pictures by his mother Leida Org, created in applique technique, which once garnered great attention in Sweden.

In the 1960s, Mart Org worked for a while as a theater artist, and the textile remnants he brought from work inspired his craft-loving mother Leida to create large applique technique textile pictures. Initially opposing her son's art studies, after the death of her husband, she decided to sell their painstakingly built strawberry farm and unexpectedly dedicate herself to art. Leida Org quickly gained the attention of recognized art critics, and her work offered new and unexpected perspectives from a feminist art interpretation aspect. 

Leida Org has exhibited her work in prestigious galleries, including the Gummeson Gallery, where works by Kandinsky, Warhol, and other great figures have been displayed. Both mother's and son's works have been purchased for the Swedish royal art collection, which after Gustav Adolf's death moved to the collection of the Swedish National Museum. Four of Mart Org's paintings have also been acquired by the New York Seagram Collection. In their homeland, the work of Mart and Leida Org is represented in the collections of the Estonian Art Museum. Now, with the support of the National Archives and the Cultural Endowment of Estonia, their major life work has nearly fully reached the Pärnu Museum.

Exhibition curators: Marian Grau, Jan Leo Grau, Indrek Aija
Contributors to the exhibition: National Archives, Cultural Endowment of Estonia, Mart Org, Henrik Fergin, Urve Sopp