Toomas Altnurme alias Pomshiva planned his personal exhibition to the end of May because the fully blooming spring has a symbolic meaning for the artist. It is the spring as the time of rebirth and revival that favours creation and giving soul to material and form. The time when the days grow longer and the sun shines more brightly is just right for putting on display the paintings and digital graphics that are positive to the core. Take, for example, the pair of paintings called “Spring at Heart” that radiate the joyous and carefree impulses of spring with their luminous colour palette and slightly transparent surface structure.

The exhibition where the visual and metaphysical levels constitute a harmonious whole can tentatively be divided into two parts – oil paintings painted on canvas, velvet and sailcloth, and digital prints. In addition a few colourful papier maché sculptures have been hidden between them. It is difficult to describe or sort the works of Altnurme by means of universal art terminology and –categories. One should rather try to capture the emotions, vibes and sensations emanating from them. The oversized oil paintings and digital pictures are mystical, psychedelic, larger than life, full of coded messages, dream-like visions, the all-embracing universe, powerfulness, sublimity. The shades of colour that Altnurme uses are intense and artificial as if not from this world, unlikely to be found in Estonian landscapes. They probably originate from Asia where the artist studied and worked for a long period. In his artistic creation the author whose intellectual world has broadened in different art media and cultural environments is driven by a noble mission – to bring a bit of sunshine into the grey everyday life and thus make the world a better place. Through art he wishes to create a new reality of enjoyment – one can float like a cloud and flow like a river.

With his works saturated with surreal and abstract images Pomshiva is a mediator between the metaphysical and real world, opening doors into alternative realities. The woman laughing and crying simultaneously in the huge round-shaped painting called “Seventh dimension of metaphysics” reflects perhaps best the author's role of a mediator. Illegible and indecipherable letters that seem to originate from outer space or “the other side” recur in several paintings. These are lines from the messages of joy, the meaning of which each viewer will find according to his or her own wishes and dreams.

The sensations and impulses for creating his works have arisen from the artist's dreams and the endless treasury of the subconscious mind. In the digital picture “Dream state” the images that first seem indistinct become clearly outlined figures and characters blending softly into one with the space between them – just like in a dream where it is difficult to establish the border between real and unreal. The characters and thought fragments scattered in different pictures can be put together into narrative puzzles by the viewer himself. At the same time Altnurme taps us on the shoulder and reminds us that life itself is art – “look around you and enjoy life and the spring!”