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Invisible Tramline

Aleksandra Ianchenko

synopsis

Lenght

04m29s

Year

2021

university

Tallinn University, Estonia and Åbo Akademi University, Finland

technical info

  • Cameraman: Henri Petruits
  • Editing: Jaan Kronberg
  • Acting: Tauri Tuvikene, Jegor Sevastjanov, Andrei Kedrin, Aleksandra Ianchenko
  • Music: Danny Eel
  • Special thanks: Sarii Sarii, Louise Sträuli, Peter Zottl
  • Supported and co-funded by PUTSPACE, HERA Joint Research Programme; AKA, BMBF via DLR-PT, ETAg, and Horizon 2020

This video documents a skiing performance on Laagna road, the main transport channel of Lasnamäe, a district of Soviet-style apartment blocks in Tallinn. The broad space in the middle of the road was planned for a high-speed tram in the late 1970s, which never launched. The absent tram remains present today in local memories and hopes as well as in infrastructural details with no practical use. Four performers reenacted its tracks by leaving ephemeral skiing traces.

The performance and film is part of Ianchenko’s research, Estrangening Atmospheres of Trams in and through Art, which investigates atmospheres of tramways by means of site-specific performances and on-site sketchings. The project is also part of PUTSPACE (Public Transport as Public Space in European Cities: Narrating, Experiencing, Contesting) www.putspace.eu

Aleksandra Ianchenko is a visual artist, graphic designer, curator and researcher who works in the intersection between art, design and academia. She is currently finishing her PhD thesis about atmospheres of tramways which she examines by means of site-specific performances and on-site sketchings. In her artistic research, she relies on the idea of estrangement or ostranenie, i.e. making such a mundane thing as public transport unfamiliar or strange which helps to explore and play with its atmospheres.