Located in a 5-story building with neoclassical architectural style, Erarta is not only a place to store more than 2,800 works by 300 artists across the land of white birch, but also an inspiring philosophical space.
With a name that combines "Era" (age) and "Arta" (art - originally from Latin), the museum establishes a different mission: To create an aesthetic environment to nurture the personality and freedom of expression of each individual. Here, art is not a strange artifact on the high podium; a work only truly "born" when it establishes a bond with the audience. According to the spirit of famous artist Joseph Beuys: "Everyone is an artist", each visitor contributes to perfecting the meaning of the work through their own lens and experience.
The uniqueness of Erarta lies in breaking down barriers to traditional aesthetic "tastes". The museum encourages viewers to evaluate the work based on the criterion of "interesting" instead of "good or bad", because the interest will lead us to explore our own inner self instead of just consolidating existing experiences.
The visual journey at Erarta takes viewers through diverse extremes: From Dmitri Kawarga's interactive arrangements such as "The Model of Bipolar Activity", where sensor technology turns viewer brain data into sound and images, to reflections on Russian identity in Felix Volosenkov's "Pagans" series. If Kawarga turns art into a scientific experiment on cognition, Volosenkov delves into layers of ancient spiritual memories that coexist in modern life.
Besides, Pavel Belyaev's paintings with pale palettes and blurred images open up a quiet spiritual space, where the small becomes meaningful through intuition and contemplation... And many other diverse and rich works bring delicate visual experiences.
To fully enjoy the spirit of Erarta, the museum advises that everyone should be their best friend. Don't be too dependent on the artist's reputation or the opinions of critics, because all great artists have been unknown and a negative opinion is still better than indifferent silence.
Listening to yourself and forming personal views is the shortest way for contemporary art to help us understand ourselves better. With a combination of massive scale and humanistic philosophy, Erarta is not only a destination for beauty lovers, but a place where anyone can freely release creative energy and find a part of their identity in the flow of contemporary art.
