Sooster's Eggs

Red Egg
Ülo Sooster, 1964

Estonian nonconformist painter

(1924-1970)

 Egg on the Beach

 Ülo Sooster, 1968

Indian ink on paper
Tartu Art Museum, Estonia

Sooster's Grave, Estonia

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The artist spent long years in prison camps and he had no illusions about the regime. In 1956 he tried to return to Estonia, but it was a totally different country. That is why he stayed in Moscow, where his wife was from. Soon Sooster became the authority of authorities. Those whom Moscow had been carefully listening to, now listened carefully to this Estonian speaking Russian in a broken accent. The underground had a compassionate and respectful attitude towards this uprooted plant. Because while the local nonconformist art movement only received injections of modern Western art in small doses, he was a pupil of a totally different culture and would have withered without support and care. Although he had been torn away from Western tradition, he miraculously managed to continue working in its stream. After the artist’s death his wife gave most of the works to museums in Tartu and Tallinn.

For a long time Sooster remained a mysterious figure to those interested in art in Moscow, and his work was only widely presented in Moscow in 1979.

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