Kadri Kalve ^{Emerging artist}

Artist's country of origin: Estonia

Kadri Kalve (b. 2000) is a fantasy illustrator and painter based in Tartu, Estonia. Her artworks primarily feature characters and creatures from her own imaginary world, which she has been developing for the past decade and considers the driving force behind her creative career. Kalve’s fantasy art is deeply intertwined with themes of queerness, otherness, and reflections on how society shapes what it means to be human.

Though fantasy art often sits at the fringes of the mainstream art world — caught somewhere between being timeless and outdated — Kalve believes there is a universality to imagination that can inspire many if given the chance. For her, fantasy is an attempt to satiate an unending hunger: a longing for something bigger and more mysterious, something unseen and indescribable, something worth living for. She describes it as an “absence of nothing” felt down to her bones, which she tries to fill with her own makeshift magic. If, on this quest for the non-existent, she can find company and forge connections through her art, the journey has already been worthwhile. Without creating fantasy art, Kalve feels her soul would wither and turn to dust — or so she suspects, never having risked finding out.

Kalve holds a BA in Painting (Cum Laude) from Pallas University of Applied Sciences and is a member of the art collective MULTINEKTAR. Her recent solo exhibitions include Sanctus Päivulus, Protector Saint of Wrong Decisions at Gallery Pallas in Tartu (2023), Kaleidoscope at the Viljandi Old Water Tower (2023), Stories at the Source of Creation, a traveling exhibition with Epp Margna shown in Võru, Valga, Puka, and Võnnu (2022–2023), and Mad King and Noble Cutthroat at Physicum in Tartu (2020). She has also participated in numerous group exhibitions, such as To be a Woman at Victoria Olt Gallery (2025), Multinektar NO2 at Vein and Vine (2025), KONKU at Pallas Gallery (2025), Multinektar NO1 at Vilde and Vine (2024), Don’t want to see anything at Pallas Gallery (2024), and the Annual Exhibition of Tartu Artat Tartu Art House (2022). Her work continues to explore the mysterious edges of the human experience through the lens of fantasy, ever driven by a desire to create something larger than life.