Butterfly’s flight is a meander

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“Butterfly’s flight is a meander”

The first butterflies seen in spring are symbolic – they predict the course of summer. This year I saw three small tortoiseshells circling around each other. Around the same time, I was listening to a radio show about the 17th-18th century still life painter Rachel Ruysch.* Her allegorical vanitas** still lifes are rich in symbols of transience such as fruits, flowers, insects, everything that lives or is fresh for only a moment. Of these, butterflies, the bringers of our summers and messengers of souls, play an important role.

Soul-butterflies, however, certainly fly in meanders. Along riverbeds and antique mosaics. River meanders, by the way, are formed because the ground is never smooth and the river flow is always turbulent. I imagine that I am water and the enormous turbulence is pressing me through the earth as through life.

In any case, after getting acquainted with Ruysch’s paintings, I started to notice butterfly forms again, this time on houses in Tallinn – their wings spreading over the facades and their proboscis spiraling in window grilles, on reliefs. Reminders of the transience of life can be found everywhere. Vanitas is present here, in Keskturg, as well as in my studio, where moths announce the non-permanence of my things. In the exhibition “Butterfly’s flight is a meander“ an attempt to reconcile, but also a little resistance, are woven into silk-paintings, a tapestry and a net.

Photography: Ingrid Helena Pajo