(Timpul unei expoziții neconvenționale)
In the Greek mythology, Cronos dethroned his father, Uranus, to be later removed by his son, Zeus. With the takeover of power, to avoid rivalries and his eventual defeat, Cronos repeatedly swallowed his offsprings, the future Olympian gods, right from their birth. The scheme did not work indefinitely (he ends by regurgitating his offsprings), but the myth was interpreted as the past trying to devour the future, through suppressing the new generation by the old one. Extrapolating, the ancients associated Cronos with the time that devours the ages and implicitly, everything that happens along the way.
The visual project “CRONOS”, which brings together Ana Roșoga and Marius Cristea, is in fact a double solo show, whose common denominator is the time (in antithesis with the chosen title, but without mythological connotations). The two artists chronologically approach the subject both subjectively and anthropologically, interpreting it, as we will see below, either as a theme or as a trigger for actions. Otherwise, the artists presented are different in style, manner, technical means, but also in concept. Moreover, what differentiates them is stronger than what brings them closer, but their work is complementary, even having common boundaries.
What brought them together, beyond the fact that they both express themselves both in painting and in object or installation, is how they understand the potential relationships between the created artworks and the conditions under which these are exhibited; from the way of lighting to their competition with any architectural morphological orders or with any pre-existing objects. The two are open to the challenge of exhibiting in unconventional spaces, due to which we find them, through their artistic work, also in the Synagogue from Pitești, a construction which does not meet the requirements of an art exhibition through its very construction.
The works of Ana Roșoga, falling within the category called in the specialized literature appropriatin (art), beyond the theme in which they register, involve the use of pre-existing objects (readymade), in particular those found (found object), assembled in collages and installations where the taking over of meanings, recycling and intentional modification of fragments lead to new and surprising results.
The artistic use of materials that were not created for such purposes triggered rejection reactions right from the very first actions of Duchamp (through actions I mean the acquisition or configuration of some readymade objects and their displaying as works of art) and will continue to do so despite the theories explaining it and many famous similar readymade artworks.
The decontextualization and recontextualization of objects or fragments involves both the use of their visual qualities (colors, textures, shapes or images of a decorative or informational character), as well as the speculation of the utilitarian or cultural meanings they originally had. Here comes “the game time” in the creation of the Ana Roșoga.
In a collage, the grandfather’s tie appears as a visual sign, but it also emphasizes the idea that what was once a piece of clothing becomes in a work of art just a textile, with an exclusively visual function. In other of her artworks, beyond the embedded images, the postcards are reminiscent of times and places, being practically messages from the past. The fragments of the scores rhythms, also “hatch” certain parts of various artworks, but link to the time when they were composed, edited and in which they were read by performers until they became unusable.
Ana Roșoga intervenes moderately on the fragments in her collages, which turns them into picto-objects, removing them from the classic readymade, if we admit that there is such a classification. The artist counterbalanced the works made by collage with so-called simple paintings, in oil or acrylic on canvas.
During the opening, Marius Cristea put up the “Time after Time” performance, in which he operated irreversible interventions on an important painting of his creation, an artwork of no less than six square meters, previously exhibited at the Library of the Romanian Academy Hall (not only), in 2018 a solo show. After years of hard work, events in which it was exhibited or waited (in the warehouse), transformed into fragments, finally it has acquired a new form of existence through performance. This is how the artist relates to time.
From another point of view, the artwork cut by Marius Cristea and transformed into several paintings, by fixing parts of it on various frames, however great the loss of material, it’s not an easy job, in no case one that was created for this purpose. The artist does not have, in his entire creation, artworks on which he may intervene without regrets, or at least without the feeling that something has been irretrievably lost. On the contrary, the artist’s images are distinguished by strength, vitality and refinement.
Marius Cristea’s painting, especially when working in medium and large dimensions, has its anchors in figurative, but it develops as a chromatic abstraction and has modular solutions, with strong decorative references. Figurative visual signs, “hidden” among often gesturalist touches, usually portraits, avian, floral, cruciform or esoteric motifs, are organically integrated into the field of the artworks, signaling their presence concisely, but discreet.
For the purposes of the above analysis, the number of parts, related cuts and routes followed by the cutter blade were thoroughly premeditated. The artist, beyond the fact that he knows best how, what and why he worked on the original canvas, also knows exactly where he wants to go. In order to avoid possible errors, because of instinct or automatic dictation, he made rigorous documentation regarding the dimensions of the resulting fragments, the frames, the golden ratio, in relation to the new dimensions and last but not least, to the losses of the material and with them, of the image itself. Documentation is a part of the performance and of the whole project.
Returning to the subject of the this exhibition, since the middle of the last century, artists such as Yves Klein or Joseph Beuys have experienced leaving the galleries through performance and attitude, catalysts of the audience, given that the modern (or postmodern) public, tends to look at artworks without really seeing them. By associating their artistic work, materialized in artworks, with the unconventional space and with the performance, Ana Roșoga and Marius Cristea are part of the concept of social sculpture, theorized since the ’70s by the same Beuys, still relevant today. Given that people tend to pass by galleries without enter, artists can be part of the road between them and the public, by means that cannot be specificated by any algorithm, for example by consecrating temporary galleries in buildings or places non-specific.
The museographic set-up approach does not aim, in our case, the unification of the interior space, but the speculation of the visual signs on the premises, be they decorative, rhythmic motifs, windows, trails or furniture, for the purpose of configuring areas of (visual) interest independent of the general ensemble. The aim is for the viewer to be able to mentally detach the artworks from the given dectoration context, freeing up from the “tyranny“ of neighborhoods, arbitrary associations and mutual influences, “dangers” lurking in all conventional galleries. The big challenge is to let the artworks reveal their artistic qualities through what they are, not through formulas, tricks, customs or exposure strategies.
Mihai Plămădeală, curator