CANTEMIR Programme // Visiting Recent History

Visiting Recent History, a project organized by MATCA artspace from Cluj-Napoca (RO), aims to present a collective exhibition to be held at ȚOL Artist Run Space and a public discussion at Zpațiu (Casa Zemstvei) in Chișinău. The project connects countries that share a border with Romania or countries that have gone through transitions or regime changes in the year 1989—through both physical and imaginary itineraries—designed to provide research opportunities for artists within a project inspired by transitions, mutations, and the "ongoing past" of Central-East European culture. The theme of the entire project is the problematization of the paradoxes underlying the concept of freedom.

Following a call open throughout July, named Rezidențe în mișcare, the project team selected 5 applications developed by the selected artists to date. The artists who traveled were Clara Caradimu and Teodor Georgescu (Rep. Moldova); Lorena Cocioni (Bulgaria); Teona Galgoțiu (Germany); Győrfi Kata (Hungary); Anio Ciutac and Marco Verhoogt (Czechia and Slovakia). Some of the residents will participate in a public discussion hosted by the Oberliht Association at Zpațiu on September 18, followed by music and socializing at Grădina Stalker in the courtyard of Casa Zemstvei. During this event, the MATCA artspace team will present their more or less recent activity, and some of the attending artists will showcase their research from the Rezidențe în mișcare program, or they will talk about their practice.

Visiting Recent History – Public Discussion
Wednesday, September 18, 2024, 19:00-23:00
Zpațiu / Grădina Stalker (Casa Zemstvei, str. Al. Șciusev nr. 103, Chișinău)
With Alexandra Mocan, Matei Toșa, Anio Ciutac, Kata Győrfi, Clara Caradimu & Teodor Georgescu, Gergely István, Alexandru Muraru

A musical program featuring Cezar Cîmpeanu, Alexandra Mocan, and other guests

The exhibition at ȚOL Artist Run Space, opening to the public on September 20, will feature two modes of presenting artistic contributions in the exhibition space: it will include the 5 contributions developed as part of the Residencies in Motion call and contributions from 6 additional artists/artist duos: Mihai Grecu, Roberta Curcă, Vlad Olariu, Alexandru Mihai Budeș & Lisa Marie Schmitt, Tudor Pătrașcu, Gergely István, Alexandru Muraru. During the opening, starting 20.00, there will also be a video screening in the courtyard of ȚOL Artist Run Space with works by artists Mihai Grecu, Lisa Marie Schmitt, and Alexandru Mihai Budeș.

RE:Visiting Recent History – Group Exhibition
Anio Ciutac & Marco Verhoogt, Teona Galgoțiu, Lorena Cocioni, Kata Győrfi, Clara Caradimu & Teodor Georgescu, Mihai Grecu, Roberta Curcă, Vlad Olariu, Alexandru Mihai Budeș & Lisa Marie Schmitt, Tudor Pătrașcu, Gergely István, Alexandru Muraru
September 20, 2024 – October 3, 2024
Opening: Friday, September 20, 18:00
Video Screening: Friday, September 20, 20:00
ȚOL Artist Run Space, str. Mitropolit Vaarlam 50, Chișinău

In a context where travel beyond borders was rarely possible for Romanian citizens before 1989, the act of crossing borders holds a conceptual role in the project's structure and in relation to the theme of "Freedom." The connection with the Republic of Moldova is also deliberate—showcasing 11 artists in a state where freedom is a construct that strongly marks the identity of the place, closely tied to the history of recent decades, as well as the fragility and proximity to the war in Ukraine.

Rezidențe în mișcareprovides the context for exploring Central and Eastern European areas and their relationship with freedom over the past 35 years. By examining the paradoxical aspects underlying freedom, we seek contributions that investigate unresolved aspects of this topic. Possible themes of reflection include Central and Eastern European society viewed through the lenses of capitalism, political and consumer power, living modes and gentrification, current political conflicts, migration, labor/exploitation, education, minorities, solidarity, women's condition in Central-Eastern European society, corrupt systems creating a safe framework for political power, etc. Paradoxes of the concept of freedom in the European space, especially in countries bordering Romania or countries that experienced revolutions in 1989, are questioned in this context.

Rezidențe în mișcare invited artists to propose research topics that can be deepened through travel, with each applicant having the freedom to choose the duration, location, and subject of their individual research.

// Visiting Recent History, a project investigating the relationship between freedom and recent changes in the shared history of Central-Eastern European countries. Project initiated by Alexandra Mocan and curated together with Matei Toșa.

BIO // ENG

Teona Galgoțiu (b. 1998, Bucharest) is a filmmaker and writer. She has participated in prestigious festivals like Sarajevo, Oberhausen, and Ji.hlava. Her writings appear in Zona Nouă, Dragă Virginia, and Lighthouse Literary Journal. Since 2014, she has been involved with the Super Festival, which educates teenagers through art, and founded the Gura Mare platform, winning the “Poetic Experiment” Award. Her debut poetry volume, I look back and it’s gone, published in 2020, won the Iustin Panța Debut Award and ARCCA Poetry Book of the Year. Her latest play, I can only fall asleep if I imagine it is snowing, will be staged at the National Theatre in Sibiu and the Theater of Essen. In 2023, she won the "Best Short" award at the Gopo National Awards for her film ”I want to shatter the greenhouse”.

Kata Győrfi is a Hungarian poet and bilingual playwright from Romania, active for over ten years. In 2019, she published the poetry collection Te alszol mélyebben, which was nominated for the György Petri literary award and ranked among the top ten for the Péter Horváth Literary Grant. Since 2017, her plays have been performed and translated into both Romanian and Hungarian. Her poetry explores a post-apocalyptic world, while her dramas focus on themes of loneliness and individuals who do not fit into society. She holds degrees in philosophy, aesthetics, and theatre theory, with a strong interest in theatrical phenomenology and post-absurdism. She is currently represented by Jelenkor Kiadó in Hungary.

Marco Verhoogt is a photographer interested in using photography both as a medium to capture and observe reality and as a poetic tool to fragment and rearrange reality into stories, poems, and photographic essays. He studied documentary photography at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, which developed both his technical skills and his ability to structure and integrate a project. He is not particularly interested in the "art world" or the "photography world," but rather in the intersections between the shared world we inhabit and the power of photography, along with cultural languages, to intervene constructively. He considers this approach to be of critical importance.

Anio Ciutac is an architect, a graduate of the Cardiff School of Architecture, passionate about integrating architecture into a multidisciplinary context through research and collaboration. She is drawn to areas of historical friction, where personal memories intertwine with collective experiences. Anio sees cities, villages, and liminal spaces as direct manifestations of communities. For her, architecture is not limited to creating structures but is defined by the relationship between place, society, and inhabitants, with the architect serving as the bridge between them.

Lorena Cocioni (b. 1995) lives and works in Bucharest. Her practice explores body senses and everyday rituals like washing, dressing, and self-care. She combines materials like feathers, soaps, glass, metal, and ceramics to create works that evoke both an ancient past and a blurred future. Her recent research focuses on femininity as a duality of inside and outside spaces, examining women as both creators of spectacle and as spectacles themselves throughout history.

Clara Caradimu (b. 2001) and Teodor Georgescu (b. 1999) are an artistic duo from Bucharest. In their various collaborations, they have explored themes surrounding gender roles and the intersection between the real and the dreamlike, working with photography and video as well as sculpture and installation. They share a studio within the Scânteia Studios, where they manage "la fereastră" ("at the window"), a hybrid space dedicated to carrying out young artists' projects.

Roberta Curcă (b. 1991, Romania) is a Bucharest-based artist working with drawing, photography, objects, and artist books. In her work she employs a systematic investigation into various types of structures or images that describe or subvert the human’s relationship to the built or natural world and the psychological, social, political or ecological implications of this relationship. She has studied at the National University of Arts in Bucharest inside the Graphic Arts Department and is currently a PhD candidate at the Center of Excellence in Image Study (CESI) in Bucharest. Her visual documentation projects include the online photographical archives of the Instagram accounts @border_marks_archive and @tiles.and.tiles.

Gergely István began studying the violin at the age of 7 at the Sigismund Toduță Music College in Cluj-Napoca and continued his studies at the Gheorghe Dima National Academy of Music, where he deepened his violin studies and studied composition with Professor Cristian Misievici. He has composed numerous works, including the string quartet "4D-sonances", the trio "Hommage à trois" (Special Prize at the Sigismund Toduță International Competition 2017), "(Dés)accords" for viola and string orchestra, and "Subversive connections" for two violins and piano. Since 2020, he has dedicated himself to electronic music, performing as a DJ under the name Sonocrat, and participating in various projects as a producer and composer.

Tudor Pătrașcu (b. 1979) is a visual artist based in Iași, known for his work with the artistic duo ANTICAMERA (2014 – 2021). Drawing is central to his practice, serving as a cognitive tool linked to archival methodologies. His projects explore themes of personal and collective memory, politics, warfare, and crisis.Selected exhibitions: „Occupy Art Festival | Occupy #3 NETWORKS”, New York (2022); „Future Collection”, apARTe Gallery, Iași (2021); Black-and-White Biennial, Museum of Art, Satu Mare; „Virus Diary”, White Cuib Gallery, Cluj-Napoca (2020); „Show off 2”, MATCA artspace, Cluj-Napoca (2019); Biennale Jeune Création Européenne, Montrouge, France (2019); „BOOKS + PAPERS II”, Christine König Gallery, Vienna (2019); „Memory as Vision”, Cluj Cultural Center, Cluj-Napoca (2018); „Transcultural Emancipation”, FLUC, Vienna (2018); „Flag Down The Flag”, Art Encounters Foundation, Timișoara (2018).

Mihai Grecu is a multimedia visual artist, film director and producer, born in Romania in 1981. He currently lives in France, where he completed his studies at the Fresnoy Studio of Contemporary Arts.

Recurrent in his works are themes that reflect on natural disasters, disintegration, or on the subconscious, dominated by political allegories. A state of stillness, of contemplation, is usually present in his works that use new technologies to generate possible new territories of existence - sublimely and seductively staged, but at the same time - miserable underneath.

Alexandru Muraru (b. 1990) lives and works in Cluj-Napoca. He studied Painting and History (Archaeology) in Cluj-Napoca and is a co-founding member of MATCA artspace. One of the main concerns in his visual work is the search for coherence in the immediate world and the identification of conceptual channels through which scientific truths can be summarized. Thus, his paintings, drawings, or installations find their fundamental source of inspiration in recent historical past, science fiction, and literature. Last but not least, he seeks to convey emotions, irony, and personal convictions through visual language – most often from a critical stance towards society, dogmas, and systems.

Vlad Olariu

Born in 1983, Roman, Romania/ lives and works in Cluj, Romania

Vlad Olariu is dealing mainly with the mediums of sculpture and installation. His works are constructed around the ideas of monumentality and heroism. Alternates between heroism and anti-heroism, monument and anti-monument, masterpiece and anti-masterpiece by questioning its political, historical, social or individual meanings.

Alexandru Mihai Budeș (*1992 in Sebeș, Romania) studied Theory and History of Art at the Universitatea Națională de Arte in Bucharest and later pursued an MA in Fine Arts/Sculpture, completing a scholarship abroad at Hochschule der Bildenden Künste Saar in Saarbrücken. He attended various Artist in Residency Programs, including Cité Internationale des Arts Paris (2019) and DEPO Institute Istanbul (2022). His works have been exhibited internationally at venues such as the National Museum for Contemporary Art MNAC in Bucharest and the Romanian Cultural Institute in Paris. His recent solo exhibitions include Roam Projects Berlin and Atelier35 in Bucharest. He was recently awarded the Research Stipend by the Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion. Alexandru Mihai Budeș lives and works in Berlin and Romania.

Lisa Marie Schmitt (*1991 in Trier, Germany) studied Fine Arts (Video/Photography and Sculpture) at Hochschule der Bildenden Künste Saar in Saarbrücken. After graduating in 2017, she attended a residency at Cité Internationale des Arts Paris funded by Künstlerhaus Schloss Balmoral. She has received several scholarships, including the GLOBAL Stipendium by the Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe (2021) and the Stipendium Neustart Plus by Stiftung Kunstfonds (2023). Her works have been presented in various exhibitions, including the Arp Museum, Kunsthalle Mannheim, Brücke-Museum Berlin, and Kunstverein Ludwigshafen. Her most recent solo shows have been at Galerie Bernau and Roam Projects Berlin. Lisa Marie Schmitt lives and works in Berlin and Romania.

ȚOL Artist Run Space is a space dedicated to contemporary art in Chișinău, founded in August 2023. It supports artists from the Republic of Moldova and the diaspora, offering them a platform for artistic and conceptual dialogue. In its first year of activity, ȚOL organized nine exhibitions – seven solo shows and two group exhibitions – exploring diverse artistic practices and technologies. The space promotes contemporary art and aims to stimulate local public interest, functioning as a research and artistic exploration laboratory within Chișinău's cultural context.

Asociaţia Tinerilor Artiști Oberliht is a non-governmental, voluntary, politically unaffiliated organization, established as a Youth Public Organization aimed at public benefit. It acquired legal personality on July 6, 2000. Building on extensive experience as an independent cultural actor, Oberliht Association aims, on one hand, to support young artists and contribute to their professional development, and on the other hand, to connect members of the cultural scene and form an artistic community using public spaces. In this regard, the Association has initiated, developed, and maintains cultural platforms such as [oberlist], Apartamentul Deschis, and Zpațiu, as well as projects aimed at connecting both local and international contemporary art and culture initiatives. Through its advocacy initiatives, the Association advocates for a strong independent cultural sector in Moldova and the region. The Association's activities are carried out on a voluntary basis and adhere to the principles of self-management and non-profit activity.

Zpațiu is a project space and a platform for supporting and presenting contemporary art practices and promoting civic activism. It emerged on the cultural map of Chișinău in 2013, with the goal of building a community and providing open spaces for independent cultural initiatives in Moldova.

MATCA artspace is an independent artist-run space in Cluj-Napoca, reconfigured from a former leather workshop. Founded in 2017 by Alexandra Mocan, Alexandru Muraru, and Matei Toșa, the space was created in response to the need for accessible platforms for local artists. MATCA explores and reflects on the evolution of contemporary art, trends, and recent global events, as well as how artistic discourse is shaped around them. Through organizing events and exhibitions, the space serves as a research platform for local art, facilitating dialogue between emerging and established artists, both local and international. MATCA encourages experimentation with alternative media, beyond traditional frameworks, and promotes non-commercial artistic practices. To date, MATCA has organized 69 exhibitions and collaborated with over 200 artists. Recent projects reflect a focus on cultural/artistic labor and an orientation towards research-based, dialogic, and participatory practices, leading the space initiate residencies, discussions, and workshops.

This project is co-financed by the Romanian Cultural Institute through the Cantemir Programme - a funding framework for cultural projects intended for the international environment.

The Romanian Cultural Institute cannot be held responsible for the content of this material.

The public discussion at Zpațiu, organized in partnership with the Oberliht Association, is made possible with the support of FundAction and the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Moldova. It is hosted by Zpațiu and Grădina Stalker, with media partners #diez, youth.md, fest.md, and platzforma.md, and technical support from CSCI of Moldova.