Trail Baltic / Väljasõit rohelisse

2018/2020/2022

documentary film ; 12 day durational performance

In October 2020 I hiked for 12 days, from Ikla to Ülemiste, covering more than 300km on a potential path of Rail Baltic in Estonia, a massive railway infrastructure project to connect Finland with Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. To see and capture the place that excists due to its danger to disappear in exchange of Rail Baltic and to give opportunity for anyone else to join me along the way. A GoPro camera was attached to my chest and the whole journey live-streamed on an Estonian
independent media channel Levila.ee.

In spring 2023, a documentary film based on my recordings was released (see video below)

Link to the 12-day performance:
https://levila.ee/video/trail-baltic-on-eetris

An interactive map (in progress, to be published in September 2023) with video material coverage of entire planned Rail Baltic railway line in Estonia. The visitors can click on any point on the map and see video footage of chosen location. The map includes short stories describing my various encounters and thoughts throughout 12 days.

Review: Eero Epner on Trail Baltic

(originally published in Postimees 07.11.2020)

Hanna Samoson’s journey along the Rail Baltic route can be seen as a ritual with the talk of disappearance at its heart. With her body, the artist marks a path in nature that still exists today, but may not in the future. By sloshing through the bush, a sense of purpose is given to places otherwise seen as of little significance, suddenly debris and litter gain greater meaning to us. It may happen that after Samoson’s journey we start to sympathize with these places that are unfamiliar to us, but it may also happen that we look at it all with indifference and see it all as an inevitable course of life – Samoson herself does not give assessments, but recedes to being the one who guides the ritual and introduces the route.The physical dimension of Samoson’s action must be emphasized. In the information age we don’t only make decisions, but we also replace physical experiences with mediated ones – we watch life on screens. What is important in this ritual is the exhaustion of the body due to days of constant moving, reminiscent of the journey genre of barefoot apostles per pedes apostolorum. The body is twisted, the mind sharpens, the feeling of human helplessness and smallness increases, humility arises in front of something greater. In front of what? Nature? Railway? Time? Space? Don’t know.