Press release from Center for Contemporary Arts, Estonia 2005:

ESTONIA
ISOLATOR

5th official participation

Palazzo Malipiero, San Marco 3079 (San Samuele) - 30124 Venice
Commissioner: Sirje Helme
Curator: Hanno Soans
Organiser: Center for Contemporary Arts, Estonia
Co-organiser: Arte Communications

Isolator, representing Estonia in the 51. Venice Biennial is a solo show of Mark Raidpere. Raidpere started in the mid-1990s as a model and fashion photographer. The project Isolator combines photography with video installation. “Io” is a series of traumatic self portraits pairing homoerotic motives with glorified signs of self mutilation. “10 men” (2003), a video made out of the photo session with convicts reveals his interest in prison as a zone of social rejection. In the videos “Father” (2001), “Voices” (2004) and “Shifting Focus” (2004) through almost compulsive returns to the family scene and attentiveness to minute psychological details, the determinedly private nature of his work acquires wider social meaning.