Eike Eplik
Eike Eplik is a sculptor and installation artist who is deeply fascinated by biodiversity and its complicated relationship with humankind. She creates sensitive and imaginative works full of personal mythology through different visual expressions and materials such as clay, plaster, metal, wood and ready-made. Echoing philosopher Astrida Neimanis’s idea of water-connected worlds, the artist takes a humble approach to all living things, and in her art, strictly defined categories and hierarchies do not exist. Her creations can be described as micro-worlds inhabited by different creatures in co-existence with fungi and plant forms, including their roots and cones. Animating the life forms and vessels that incubate them, Eplik’s sculptures inhabit the rooms in a way that recalls a bird constructing a nest, or mycelia creating a complicated network of roots.
Eike Eplik (b. 1982, Rapla, Estonia) is an Estonian artist living in Tartu. In her formal education, she received a master’s from the Sculpture Department at the Estonian Academy of Arts in 2010 and a bachelor’s degree from the Sculpture Department at Tartu Art College in 2007. Eplik received the Annual Prize of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia in 2021, the Addo Vabbe Stipend in 2018, the young artist production stipend KUKU NUNNU of the contemporary art festival ART IST KUKU NU UT in 2012, the Eduard Wiiralt Stipend in 2006, and in 2015, she was nominated for the Sadolin Art Prize. Eplik was one of the recipients of the national artist’s salary from 2021 to 2023.
Eplik’s recent exhibitions include In Times When Everything Else Seems More Important at Kogo Gallery in Tartu, Estonia (2025); White Dwarfs and All Those Beautiful Nebulas at Kim? Contemporary Art Centre in Riga, Latvia (2024–2025); Down In The Bog – Sporulation at the Estonian Museum of Contemporary Art (EKKM) in Tallinn, Estonia (2024); Emotional Landscapes at Arka Gallery in Vilnius, Lithuania (2023); Growing Out? Growing Up? Contemporary Art Collecting in the Baltics at Zuzeum Art Centre in Riga, Latvia (2022); My Bitter Sweet Frankenstein Body at Titanik in Turku, Finland (2022); Shared Territory at Tartu Art Museum in Tartu, Estonia (2021); Biomass – Ghost in the Corner at Kogo Gallery in Tartu, Estonia (2020). Kogo Gallery has presented Eike Eplik’s works at art fairs such as ArtVilnius’25 (2025), Esther II in New York (2025) and Liste Art Fair Basel (2021).
The artist’s works are part of the collections of the Estonian Art Museum, Tartu Art Museum, the Estonian Ceramics Association, TAAD Foundation, as well as several private collections.
Eike Eplik is represented by Kogo Gallery.
Exhibitions at Kogo
Press and Publications
Publications
Shared Territory and Other Exhibitions From 2011-2021
Artist book, size: 280×220 mm, 296 pages, language: Estonian & English. Tartu Art Museum 2021
Eike Eplik. Biomass – Ghost in the Corner
Exhibition catalogue. Language: Estonian & English. Kogo Gallery 2020
The Girl Who Loved Everything
Exhibition catalogue. Language: Estonian & English. Contemporary art festival ART IST KUKU NU UT 2012
Press
IN ENGLISH
Artist in Focus: Eike Eplik
Contemporary Lynx, July 2025
Six Questions for Eike Eplik
Tique, January 2024
An environmental book club that ended with an exhibition
Arterritory, 21.09.2021
Review by Maria Helen Känd of a group exhibition The Bamby Project at Kogo Gallery (27.8.2021 – 30.10.2021)
Plant Punk and Poetics
MAJA, Summer 2021
Essay by Eike Eplik in an Estonian architectural review
Nature constantly shows you that nothing is forever
Arterritory, 8 July 2021
Q&A with the artists Mari-Leen Kiipli, Eike Eplik and curator Šelda Puķīte
Would you dare hold a lizard? Eike Eplik – the artist who has nature nesting in her subconscious
KUNST.EE 2/2021
Kaire Nurk visited Eike Eplik’s solo exhibition Shared Territory and delved deeper into her work
The Biomass Case
Estonian Art, The Anthropocene Issue, 2/2020
Review by Hasso Krull
The Opening Response: Eike Eplik
Umbigo, 12 June 2020
Interview by Josseline Black-Barnett
Ghost in the Corner. Šelda Puķīte interviews Estonian artist Eike Eplik
Echo Gone Wrong, 20 April 2020
Interview by Šelda Puķīte
Generation of young sculptors as a distinct phenomenon
Estonian Art 2/2013
Article by Marie Vellevoog
IN ESTONIAN
Meie igapäevane kurjus
Sirp 20.4.2021
Review by Kaisa Eiche on a solo exhibition Eike Eplik. Shared Territory at Tartu Art Museum 13.2.2021 – 30.5.2021)
Suur lugu. „Kui pole ruumi, pole ka teoseid“ ehk kus töötavad kunstnikud Tallinnas ja Tartus?
Center For Contemporary Arts, Estonia, 9.11.2020
Q&A by Kaarin Kivirähk and Marika Agu with several artists, including Eike Eplik
Eplik feat. Heinsaar
Sirp, 22.5.2020
Review by Janek Kraavi on a solo exhibition Biomass – Ghost in the Corner by Eike Eplik at Kogo Gallery (13.5.2020 – 30.5.2020)
Mõõn paljastab nii mõndagi
Müürileht, 25.5.2020
Review by Kaisa Eiche on a solo exhibition Biomass – Ghost in the Corner by Eike Eplik at Kogo Gallery (13.5.2020 – 30.5.2020)
Näitus, mis tekitab hajusaid ja ebamääraseid meeleolusid
Postimees, 26.5.2020
Review by Krista Piirimäe on a solo exhibition Biomass – Ghost in the Corner by Eike Eplik at Kogo Gallery (13.5.2020 – 30.5.2020)
Ede Raadik, biomass galeriis, nahkhiired ja taimetervis
Kaisa Ling. Klassikaraadio, ERR, 15.5.2020
Uinuv mõistus sünnitab koletisi
Janar Ala. Postimees, 4.2.2019
Eike Eplik: Võiksin jälle neid mügaraid teha
Postimees, 15.10.2018
Miks just nüüd keraamika ja savi?
Heie Marie Treier. Sirp, 2.11.2018
Kole on varjatud – nagu ikka
Kaire Nurk. Sirp, 13.10.2017
Eike Eplik mängib kaduva iluga
Krista Piirimäe. Postimees, 10.10.2017
Seest siiruviiruline, pealt kullakarvaline
Lilli-Krõõt Repnau. ERR, 10.10.2017
Artishoki Biennaal. Kohtuvad Eplik ja Soans
Hanno Soans. Postimees, 14.10.2016
Artishok Biennale texts about project Staging
Various authors, 2016
Video: Tallinna Linnagaleriis avati Eike Epliku näitus
News clip about the exhibition Some of These Birds Flew on Their Backs. ERR, 23.9.2015
Skulptorid, kes on ajast ja klišeedest üle
Mari Kartau. ERR, 7.10.2015
Intervjuu Eike Eplikuga
Hanna-Liis Kont. Kunst ja avalik ruum, 20.11.2013
Metsamuinasjutt puruvana ja hiirekesega. Vaim skulptuurides.
Ragne Nukk. Puhkepäev (Äripäev), 22.–24.3.2013
Eike Eplik sulatas (rämpsust ja loodusest) ökokatastroofi-kujulise vaagna
Mai Sööt. Postimees, 29.10.2012
Eike Eplik — Tüdruk, kes kõike armastas
Kaisa Eiche. Müürileht nr 22, 2012
Alex Reynolds