Synopsis
‘In the Storm of Roses’ reflects our time through the life choices of retired Estonian nurse Helgi Kuusik. We see her in a dream-like rose garden, in Southern Estonia, which she established years ago thanks to working in Finnish hospitals and commuting between the two linguistically close, yet economically unequal, countries.
The brief scenes of her idyllic rural garden resemble Victorian-era paintings while being linked with Helgi’s visit to her daughter’s family, who ended up living on the other side of the Gulf of Finland.
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2022
20 min - Colour- 4K DCP - 2:29.1 - 5.1, Stereo
Director: Liina Siib
Script: Liina Siib
Cinematography: Alis Mäesalu
Production design: Maiu Rõõmus, Liina Siib
Editing: Henri Nõmm, Liina Siib
Sound operator: Jevgeni Berezovski
Sound design: Hans-Gunter Lock
Producers: Len Murusalu, Tauno Novek, Liina Siib
Languages: Estonian, Võro with English subtitles
Alternative titles:
Rooside rajus
Financed by: Estonian Film Institute, Estonian Cultural Endowment
Liina Siib is a visual artist, filmmaker, educator, curator and editor who lives and works in Tallinn, Estonia. She has studied printmaking and photography at the Estonian Academy of Arts and in exchange at the University of Westminster in London.
In her artistic practice, Liina Siib uses the means of film, video, photography, installation and performance. She is intrigued by various manifestations of people’s everyday practices and social space. Her works deal with characters, spaces and situations that tend to go unnoticed due to their ordinariness or are silenced or ignored. Siib combines her field observations with archival sources, historical accounts and various narratives circulating in the society as well as with psychoanalytic approaches and contemporary art and film theories.
Recently, she has been Artist in Residence at the Vasulka Chamber, Reykjavik (2018); HIAP, Finland (2016, 2017) and Civitella Ranieri, Italy (2016).
In 2011 Liina Siib represented Estonia with her project A Woman Takes Little Space at the 54th Venice Art Biennale.
She has held personal exhibitions in Estonia, Germany, Belgium, France, Italy, Sweden, Finland and Latvia. Her recent exhibition and film projects include Linda Vilde Museum, E. Vilde Museum/Tallinn Literary Centre (2021), Huldufólk / Hidden People, Hobusepea Gallery, Tallinn (2020), Politics of Paradise, Tallinn Art Hall (2019), RIBOCA1 Riga Biennial (2018), Urban Symphony in E-minor, Sinne Gallery, Helsinki (2018). In 2020 she co-curated the international group show Resemblance Through Contact: Grammar of Imprint. at the Tartu Art House and EKA Gallery, Tallinn, Estonia.
2002–2013 she was editor of the magazine Estonian Art published by the Estonian Institute. Since 2015, Liina Siib works as a Professor of Graphic Art at the Estonian Academy of Arts.
Stills
Wherever we turn in the storm of roses,
the night is lit up by thorns, and the thunder
of leaves, once so quiet within the bushes,
rumbling at our heels.
– Ingeborg Bachmann
