Eléonore De Montesquiou (FR/EE) | Sillamäe
[ 2006, 18'00'' ]

SYNOPSIS
During the Soviet period, from 1944 until Estonia’s independence in 1991, Sillamäe was a secret and closed town built to house Russians scientists and workers who would extract uranium and do nuclear research. Sillamäe was closed even to the Estonian people, it had only a code name and did not figure in film, photo and map archives in Estonia. Since 1991 Sillamäe has become an open city with a capitalist organisation replacing the former centralised socialist system.
These new circumstances meant the working conditions changed in no time, the factory was closed, and the very reason for this city's existence vanished. The Russian people who had settled there became a minority, unable to speak the official language, in an independent Estonia.
Some have Estonian citizenship, others have Russian passports, most of them have the grey non-citizen’s passport, and they are not, or but little, integrated in the socio-economic life of Estonia. They don’t speak Estonian, but their home is here, where they were born, here life is easier than in Russia, and Estonia is a door to Europe.
ARTIST’S BIOGRAPHY
French-Estonian artist, Eléonore de Montesquiou was born in 1970 in Paris. She lives between Berlin and Tallinn. In 2008 her work is represented in a group exhibition at the Motive Gallery in Amsterdam and is shown in various solo shows in the Moscow Contemporary City Foundation, in the Magdeburg Museum in Germany and in the Gallery Antje Wachs in Berlin.
FILMOGRAPHY
- Die Pendlerinne, 2008, 30'00"
- Emilia & Joanna, 2008, 10'00"
- Atom Cities, 2006:
Kesk (3'20"), Katrin (5'00"),
Kannuka, Sillamäe (18'00"),
Padilski (22'00"),
9 Mai 2005 (19'00") - Los Chicos, 2006, 6'00"
- Griboedova, 2006
- Olga Olga Helena, 2005, 18'00"
- Televisao, 2005, 4'44"
- Nur, 2004, 4'30"
- Elaheh, 2004, 2'42"
- Delta, 2004, 20'10"
- Par ex. Ebenthal, 2004, 21'30"
- Swing, ma demeure – la putain et la maman, 2003, 24'00"
- Swing, ma demeure – ein teil von dir, 2003, 24'00"
- Pirita, 2002, 2'08"
- I practice, 2002, 3'04"
- Célibataire, 2001, 3'10"
- Minu Maja on Minu Maa (My Home is my Castle), 2001, 38'00"