Tanel Rander – Verdammter Rechen (Damn Rake)

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In his work, Tanel Rander explores the connection between language, foreign rule and one’s own identity. Videos and drawings as well as designed book covers are part of his artistic exploration of his own history and the history of Estonia. With the title „Verdammter Rechen“ (Damn Rake), Rander refers to an Estonian folk tale. It is about a young woman who returns home after studying in Germany and suffers a loss of memory. In the Baltic context, the German language is the language of foreign rule, power and cultural influence. With the establishment of trading settlements, crusades and the introduction of serfdom as early as the Middle Ages, merchants from Bremen and Kiel and the Teutonic Order dominated Estonia. Even during the subsequent foreign rule by Denmark, Sweden, Poland and Russia, the German language did not lose its cultural influence. Rander’s exploration of the significance of a language of domination, which is forcibly established in addition to the national language, ties in with Frantz Fanon’s analyses. Fanon’s basic assumption is that „to speak is to exist absolutely for the other.“[1] For Fanon, imposing the language of the colonisers means „taking a culture upon oneself.“[2] Whoever is in possession of the colonisers‘ language has the power. Similarly to the Estonian folk tale, in Fanon’s descriptions a young man returns from his studies in France to Martinique, still a French ‚overseas territory‘ today, and suffers a loss of memory. Only when his father drops a kitchen utensil on his foot does his memory return.

The artist and curator undertakes his expedition to his own self and his cultural identity from two directions: Rander attends language courses in Berlin and goes on a search for German textbooks from the late 19th and early 20th centuries in Estonia. His research is thus characterised by an observation and reflection of his own speech and at the same time the historical conditions of the present.

In a video work, Rander portrays himself during his return to his home country of Estonia after attending language courses in Berlin. As a result of his historical research, the artist presents two covers for fictitious books. For both covers, Rander uses pictures by the Baltic-German artist Friedrich Ludwig von Maydell. Their titles read: „Geschichte der Sklaverey und Charakter der Bauern in Lief- und Ehstland“ (History of Slavery and Character of Peasants in Lief- und Ehstland), alluding to a book by the German author Heinrich Johann von Jannau from 1786. The second book is entitled „Bärenfiebel“ (Bear primer) and refers to German learning books for children. The artist also finds the bear as a figure of infant learning, as a figure of language acquisition, in historical schoolbooks in Germany. Based on these findings, the bear figure in Rander’s artistic works is a hybrid figure in colonial power relations. A figure that enables the coexistence of opposing voices and contrary ideas. In the video „Fight Back/Leave it There“, the artist performatively realises this inherent hybridity. In a boxing ring and in full boxing gear, Rander fights with a rake by stepping on the device with his foot and repeatedly knocking the rake handle back. It becomes clear that the rake, which stands for his own history and collective memory, is only a „damn rake“ as long as it is activated.

Text: Dr. Silke Förschler

Sources: [1] Frantz Fanon: Schwarze Haut, weiße Maske, Frankfurt am Main 1985 (1952), p. 14. [2] Ibid.

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Tanel Rander

Tanel Rander is an Estonian artist, curator and art writer. He has always been interested in tensions between subjectivity and its internal and external influences. Throughout the last decade his work was mostly focused on East European identity and decoloniality, while during the recent years his attention has shifted towards individual and collective psychological processes. His latest solo exhibition was “Angelus Novus” (2022) in Hobusepea Gallery, Tallinn. His latest curatorial project was “Goodbye East! Goodbye Narcissus!” (2023) in Contemporary Art Museum of Estonia (EKKM). It was focused on East European collective psyche as a traumatized narcissistic constellation.

Blog: http://chnldr.blogspot.com/