The Association for Culture and Arts Arbor (Romania) and the Arbor Institute for Culture (Republic of Moldova) are pleased to invite the public from Iasi and Chisinau to the conference dedicated to the life and creation of the painter Valentina Rusu Ciobanu and to the launch of the volume “Valentina Rusu Ciobanu”, the first raisonné catalogue dedicated to this great artist from across the Prut.

Valentina Rusu Ciobanu (1920 – 2021), born in Chisinau, in the kingdom of Greater Romania, belonged to the generation formed in the intellectual effervescence of the interwar period. In the period 1942-1944 she studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Iasi, in the class of Prof. J. L. Cosmovici, assisted by the one who would become the great Corneliu Baba. With the reoccupation of Bessarabia by the Soviet troops, the young painter is forced to return to Chisinau, where she finishes her studies, together with other repatriated artists. She will succeed in a few years, despite the intimidation and restrictions exercised by the communist censorship, to assert herself as the most important name of plastic art in Chisinau.

A synthetic picture of the difficult creative conditions of those troubled years is provided by the painter herself:

I’ve been through hard times. The communists intended not only to change our way of life, but also our mentality and the criteria for judging good and evil; they came with absurd pretensions, their impertinence had a demoralizing effect especially on artists, as a painter was told what and how to draw, being required from the start to shape his work differently than he had conceived.

We took refuge in workshops and thus preserved ourselves as a living cell from which a healthy organism could develop in more favorable times. We lived a time parallel to that lived by our bitter city. And I painted for you, the people of today, with the hope that you will understand the price we paid to remain people of integrity and true creators.

Valentina Rusu Ciobanu left an impressive heritage of works, today in the family collection and in the museums of the Republic of Moldova and the Russian Federation. In Romania, a single painting by the artist is in the collection of the Bucharest Municipal Art Gallery, thanks to a private donation from 2020.

The Romanian public discovered the work of Valentina Rusu Ciobanu relatively late, 3 years ago, on the occasion of an anniversary exhibition, marking the painting’s centenary, organized at the Bucharest City Museum (Suțu Palace) by the Arbor Association. The echo among the public was a notable one, the impact also being increased by a series of related events: a VR workshop of the painter, video materials about the life and creation of the artist, a dedicated website, fundraising campaigns for the restoration of four works of -hers, and other exhibitions.

In 2023, the Arbor Association published the catalog raisonné, which is meant to contribute to the rediscovery of Valentina Rusu Ciobanu as a major female figure in contemporary Romanian art.

The realization of the catalogue was based on an impressive research work, with archival documents untapped until now, with up-to-date analysis of all the artist’s works, including those found in private collections and museums abroad. Crowning a sustained effort over the course of an entire year, the raisonné catalogue brought together specialists from both banks of the Prut: art historians, museographers, librarians, archivists, translators, writers, literary historians, typographers, audio animators and sound designers. The 400-page, two-volume catalog makes available to the public a solid critical apparatus (70 pages), vintage photographs, archival documents and 650 art reproductions in high graphic quality. The mapped work covers the period 1940 – 1993. In the last decades of her life, for health reasons, Valentina Rusu Ciobanu gave up painting, dedicating herself to her family. The hardships of the 90s, which the artist remembers with a certain frustration, will perhaps be weighed in making this decision:

What should we struggle for, why should we paint, criticize, etc… when everyone is concerned only with their material well-being, when everywhere they prey and rob, just like in fairy tales with kites and monsters disfigured by greed ?

The launch of the “Valentina Rusu Ciobanu” raisonné catalog will take place at the “George Enescu” National University of Arts in Iasi, through a conference dedicated to the painter’s work, on October 26, and in Chisinau, at the Sainciuc Rusu Ciobanu House, on October 28, 2023. As part of these events, the 8-9/2023 issue of Timpul Magazine will also be launched, which includes a substantial file dedicated to Valentina Rusu Ciobanu, designed around Bessarabian writers and filmmakers portrayed by the artist, including Alecu Russo, Lidia Istrati, Serafic Saca, Emil Loteanu, Vera Malev. The reproductions are accompanied by texts signed by chroniclers, essayists and film critics: Cristian Ispas, Ioan Stanomir, Mirela Nagâț, Victor Cobuz, Adina Dinițoiu and Victor Morozov, under the coordination of Bogdan Crețu.

The catalogue was printed in 200 copies, which will be distributed free of charge in art museums, higher institutions of artistic education and in county and city libraries in Romania, the Republic of Moldova and abroad.

Last but not least, the Arbor example demonstrates the strength of an NGO to carry out projects of major interest to the Romanian public, in a more efficient dynamic than state institutions in the field.