Drifting Through Waters | November 14 – December 6, 2026 | Paris

 

Artists: Kristina Õllek, Anne-Laure Wuillai
Curators: Merilin Talumaa, Kati Kull
Organisers: Roots to Routes in collaboration with nomaadgalerie
Researchers: Dr Andrea M. Doglioli, Dr Johannes Karstensen

Address: 47 rue Chapon, 75003 Paris

Opening reception: 13 November, 18:00–21:00
Sunday brunch & exhibition tour with the artists: 15 November, 12:00–15:00
Exhibition dates: 14 November – 6 December 2026

 

To drift is to surrender to a movement whose direction cannot always be known. It suggests a state of suspension, of being carried by currents that may lead somewhere unexpected, or nowhere at all. Beneath the seemingly endless surface of the sea, invisible processes unfold: organisms flourish and disappear, sediments accumulate, and traces of human activity travel through water, often far beyond their point of origin. There is both beauty and unease in this constant movement, a sense of life unfolding alongside the possibility of its disappearance. Bringing together Estonian artist Kristina Õllek and French artist Anne-Laure Wuillai, Drifting Through Waters explores this fragile and shifting territory between what we can observe and what remains hidden, between the sea as a source of life and as a witness to profound environmental change.

The exhibition unfolds between two bodies of water, the Baltic Sea and the Mediterranean, and two ways of approaching their changing realities. At its heart is a meeting between artistic imagination and scientific research, initiated through new collaborations established in 2026. Kristina Õllek entered into dialogue with Dr Johannes Karstensen at GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, while Anne-Laure Wuillai began working with Dr Andrea M. Doglioli at the Mediterranean Institute of Oceanography, Aix-Marseille University. Through these exchanges, observations gathered in the field, scientific knowledge, and artistic experimentation begin to flow into one another. The resulting works bring fragments of these conversations into the exhibition space, opening other ways of sensing and understanding marine environments. These encounters are not intended to end with the exhibition but to continue as long-term relationships between the artists and researchers, allowing new questions to emerge over time.

Exhibition partners: Mediterranean Institute of Oceanography; GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel; Embassy of Estonia in Paris; Galerie Eva Vautier (representing artist Anne-Laure Wuillai); Kogo gallery (representing artist Kristina Õllek).

Exhibition supporters: Estonian Cultural Endowment, Embassy of Estonia in Paris, Estonian Society of Art Historians and Curators.