Jaan Malin (Estonia)

Jaan Malin, also known as Luulur (born in 1960), is an Estonian poet, artist, art curator, essayist, editor/publisher, and more. Since 1990, JM has published 10 poetry books, including the 5 most recent: “Sulle. Juhtumata juhuluulet” (2003), “Veljesto 90 (100)” (2010), selection “Alati vahe” (2010), “Meile. Eesti Kirjanike Liit seisuga 1. jaanuar 2010” (2012), and “SA” (2020), as well as a collection of prose poetry, a non-semantic novel, 2 plays, and a CD of his own voice recordings. In 2009, he won third place at the European Poetry Slam Days in Berlin. He has participated in art exhibitions since 2013.

He has been involved in surrealist art and particularly with Estonian surrealist Ilmar Laaban. JM has compiled books of Laaban’s work, including a bilingual collection of his translations (“Magnetic River” in 2001), “Clusters of Words, Systems of Clusters” (essentially a collected poems in 2004), and the palindromic book „Eludrooge ego-ordule” (“Life Drugs for the Ego-Order”) in 2008. In 2021, he edited Ilmar Laaban’s bibliography. In the same year, the vinyl LP “ETNO-TONTE. Eesti keele kõla” was released, which is the first vinyl record with poetry in decades. In January 2023, another vinyl LP of Estonian poetry, “ETNO-TONTE 2. Metsa mõte,” is set to be released.

From 1982 to 1993, JM was a member of the Tartu Young Authors’ Association. He has been a member of the Estonian Writers’ Union since 1993, the Estonian Literary Society since 1996, the EYS Veljesto since 2008, the international performance group DAstrugistenDA since 2011, and the Estonian Artists’ Union since 2015.

From 2010 to 2018, JM organized the international interdisciplinary festival “Hullunud Tartu,” and from 2013 to 2017, he organized the literature evening series “TarSlämm.” From the spring of 2017 to the summer of 2019, he also hosted poetry/creative home salons. In 1998 and 2008, JM received the Estonian President’s Folklore Collection Award for preserving student heritage. In 2016, he received the Tartu Cultural Award for being the best Tartu cultural organizer of the year. In 2022, he received the Estonian Librarians’ Association award for Ilmar Laaban’s bibliography.

His work has been translated into English, Dutch, Lithuanian, Swedish, Romanian, Serbian, Slovenian, Finnish, Udmurt, Russian, and Hungarian. He has mainly performed his sound poetry in Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Holland, England, Iceland, Lithuania, Latvia, France, Romania, Germany, Slovenia, Finland, Denmark, Ukraine, Hungary, and Russia. In the coming year, he has been invited to participate in the European Capital of Culture programme in Veszprém and an international project the location of which is yet to be decided (possible locations include Helsinki, Antwerp, La Coruna, and Brussels), with the timeframe from March 2023 to September 2024. Usually, his performances do not include translations.