Department of Jewellery and Blacksmithing

What you can find here?
* Aesthetic utopia, eternal dimension as a spiritual quality.
* Intuition, looking for hidden treasures.
* Responsibility, demandingness, devotion.
* Respect for material, handicraft ethics.
* Warm atmosphere in department. The ones who had opportunity to experience it said that it feels like a family circle.

Professor Kadri Mälk: "The archetypal value of jewellery as a magical item, its symbolist core that in Estonia forms the intellectual cornerstone of education, requires quite intimate qualities. There is, however, no point offering the world something they already possess in abundance."

The forerunner of the present-day Estonian Academy of Arts was the Tallinn Applied Art School of the Estonian Society of Art, founded in 1914.
Estonian Academy of Arts (EAA) is the only institution in Estonia offering education at university level (BA + MA) in the fields of art and design. EAA consists of the faculties of Fine Arts, Design, Media Arts, Architecture and Conservation as well as the Institute of Art History.

Since 1999, EAA has been taking part in the European Union educational programs Socrates/Erasmus and Leonardo da Vinci.

We have signed bilateral agreements for cooperation with many universities in several countries across Europe and America (e.g., Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Ireland, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, and USA).

Head of department, professor: Kadri Mälk
Associate professors: Tanel Veenre, Heigo Jelle and Piret Hirv

Main feature of the curricula is a combination of traditional skills and contemporary thought.

Chairs of jewellery and blacksmithing have a joint Bachelor's curriculum, but within its frames a separate admission of students and an immediate specialization either in the field of jewellery or blacksmithing takes place. In addition to specific speciality-focused study (jewellery project, technology courses, history of the design), the curriculum of jewellery and blacksmithing includes also artist's project with an aim of evoking creative impulses in students and promoting one's individuality under instruction of acknowledged artists. The program includes also general art subjects: drawing, plastic anatomy, painting, sculpture, color study and humanities. As the department belongs in the Faculty of Design, its students can acquire skills and knowledge related to product design, business and product management. However, in the curriculum of jewellery the main emphasis is laid on creative projects, on the concentration on sacral and ritual meaning of jewellery and aim of the school to contrast with pragmatism.
Practices and master classes serve to deepen the professional technological skills. An extracurricular workshop, supervised by an international visiting artist, takes place every semester, plus lectures of visiting teachers.

35 internationally acclaimed artists have taughed at our department in last 10 years: Bettina Speckner, Karl Fritsch, Manuel Vilhena, Peter de Wit, Ted Noten, Ramon Puig Cuyas, Giovanni Corvaja, Noam Ben-Jacov, Paul Derrez, Peter Skubic, Manfred Bischoff, Robert Baines, Cristina Filipe, Iris Eichenberg and many others.

Department of Jewellery and Blacksmithing
Estonia pst 7 / Teatri väljak 1
10143 Tallinn,
Estonia
Tel: +372 6267315
E-mail: metall@artun.ee
www.artun.ee