Throughout October and November of 2021, I visited eight officially recognized beaches in Tallinn and tried to get to know them. From the west side, they are Kakumae, Stroomi, Pikakari, Harku Jarve, Kala, Linnahalli, Russalka, and Pirita. During my visits, I observed what I could. I tried to take in the environment fully with my senses.

I recorded my thoughts, took photographs, looked around, walked on the edge of the sea, touched the soft sand, picked up strange objects, smelled pleasant and unpleasant smells, and was inspired. I gave myself over to the power of the sea. Every part of the Tallinn coastline is eloquent and distinctive. The original idea was to shape these places, to create something like an essence out of them. But the shape itself would be too inanimate, whereas these beaches are so full of energy.

So for each beach, I created a creature that would carry the overall mood of the beach in its story, specific behavior, or significant appearance.

Kakumae’s creature is the same as its beach – rare and beautiful, Stroomi’s creature refers to the clean cut between the city and nature, Pikakari remains distant and mysterious, Harku’s creature lives next to the lake because it can’t stand aggressive salt, Kala and Linnahalli act as fake twins. Russalka beach has quite an oppressive atmosphere, and you could say its creature is sad because of it. And the anatomy of Pirita’s creature lends it easy movement across the rough surface.

In the end, I returned each creature to its original beach and let it go on living there.