The Salonul de proiecte hosts the exhibition “Together”, an artistic dialogue between Phoebe von Held, Anca Munteanu Rimnic and Mădălina Zaharia, with an intervention by Dana Andrei.
“The current exhibition takes up and expands on a number of themes explored in the previous exhibition recently held at Salonul de proiecte – ”Travels, Photographs, Friendships. Lee Miller, Lena Constante, Elena Pătrășcanu”. The lives and artistic activity of the three protagonists have brought to the foreground a complex set of questions, which the artists and researchers involved in this new phase investigate either in continuity and direct confrontation, or through an oblique perspective mediated by their own subjectivity, foregrounding contested dynamics central to the current moment
Phoebe von Held revisits and deepens some of the directions opened in the previous exhibition, focusing on the 1946 meeting in Bucharest between Lee Miller, Lena Constante and Elena Pătrășcanu. In that context, Lee Miller documented with sensitivity, ingenuity and carefully orchestrated direction the activity in the workshop of the Țăndărică theater, where a collective of women created puppets for children’s performances. Her photographs capture not only the creative process, but also their anti-fascist political concerns – an aspect that deeply resonated with Lee Miller’s interests. Phoebe von Held creates a spectacular scenography that alludes to the later paths of Lena Constante and Elena Pătrășcanu, marked by a political trial that brutally interrupted their professional trajectories and led to the irretrievable breakdown of their friendship. Dana Andrei’s research proposes a critical re-reading of the historical narrative from a contemporary socialist perspective, highlighting how the emancipatory potential of left-wing movements is eroded by the anti-communist discourse. This unilateral reading of the past functions as a mechanism to block the alternative political imaginary, while at the same time contributing to the creation of an ideological vacuum that facilitates the reactivation of forms of extremism in society.
Mădălina Zaharia’s installation explores possible ways of fictionalizing and instrumentalizing personal experience in order to gain a deeper understanding of our relationship with a world marked by conflict and alienation. The artist uses affect theory, experimental cinema, poetry and writing as a means to collectively draw and reimagine social aspirations and possible future norms. Over the last five years, film has become an increasingly important tool for the artist to understand and connect with her subconscious, creating a new kind of visual aesthetic in which shyness and introspection become the landmarks of a different way of telling a story – one that combines beauty, friendship, radical dreaming and imagination to encourage authentic and unusual ways of being in the world.
In Anca Munteanu Rimnic’s practice, the recuperation of traditional artifacts from her native space – abandoned in childhood – provides a means through which identity is analyzed and deconstructed., articulated at the intersection between personal/cultural memory and diasporic experience. The work Ceramic Carpet, which operates through a process of formal (de)construction of the geometric patterns specific to peasant rugs, becomes a space for meditation on the tension between the signs of an affective belonging, charged with melancholy and loss, and a subjectivity in a constant process of reconfiguration and symbolic rewriting. For Anca Munteanu Rimnic, engaging with traditional craftsmanship — whether appropriated as materiality or deployed as ready-made — serves as a strategy to navigate the tension between an externally imposed exoticized identity and the inherent instability of the self.” (curatorial text)
The exhibition can be visited until August 3, 2025. Visiting hours: Thursday – Sunday between 3:00 PM – 7:00 PM. Admission is free.
Address: Salonul de proiecte- Palatul Universul (Building B, 1st Floor, Ion Brezoianu 23-25, Bucharest, Romania)
This event is organized by the Salonul de proiecte Association, as part of the project ”Mobilizing Patterns: transnational female solidarities”.
Cultural project co-financed by the Administration of the National Cultural Fund. The project does not necessarily represent the position of the Administration of the National Cultural Fund. AFCN is not responsible for the content of the project or how the results of the project can be used. These are entirely the responsibility of the grantee.
Partners: National Museum of the Romanian Peasant, Radio Romania Cultural, “George Oprescu” Institute of Art History, Federation of the Jewish Communities in Romania.
With the support of: Goethe-Institut, Romania; Plan B Gallery.
