To be or not to be in Venice

   

Once every two years, the Romanian press covers the participation of Romania at the Venice Biennale. There was never a discussion however about the backstage of this event: the requests of the participation, the jury and the procedure of selection for the participating project, the organization and financing of the pavilion. As the process is far from perfect, we realized a questionnaire with those involved in the edition from 2005 and 2007, with the aim of initiating a platform for debate, which could lead to the reconsideration of the problems signaled here.


We asked different questions to the members of the jury, the candidates who made it to the final stage of the competition and the commissar of the current edition.

The components of the jury were: Virgil Niţulescu (general secretary at the Ministry of Culture), Mihai Oroveanu (director of the National Museum of Contemporary Art), Adrian Guţă (lecturer at the National University of Art in Bucharest), Romelo Pervolovici (director of Meta Cultural Foundation and of the Biennial for Young Artists in Bucharest), Ileana Pintilie (independent curator and associate professor at the Art University in Timisoara), Ion Grigorescu (artist) Marcel Bunea (lecturer at the National University of Art in Bucharest), and Timotei Nădăşan (director of Foundation and Publishing House IDEA in Cluj).* Virgil Niţulescu, Adrian Guţă and Marcel Bunea did not answer the questions. There was also an answer from Dan Perjovschi, member of the jury in 2005.

The applicants who reached the final stage of the selection were the following: Foundation Plan B in Cluj (curator Mihnea Mircan, artists Cristian Pogăcean, Victor Man, Mona Vatamanu and Florin Tudor), artist Lia Perjovschi (with curator Raluca Voinea) and curators Oana Tănase (artist Ștefan Constantinescu) and Simona Nastac (artist Victor Man). Oana Tănase did not answer to the questions, but agrees with the statement of Ștefan Constantinescu. The commissar of the 2007 edition is Mihai Pop, curator of the gallery Plan B in Cluj. We hope our initiative won’t be without consequences. We hope for a coherent, responsible and transparent organization and for an open dialogue with the Ministry of Culture. Not least, we hope those interested will write with suggestions and comments on the address pavilionul.romaniei@gmail.com.

E-cart.ro team

 

* Together with them there was also invited Matei Bejenaru (director of Periferic Biennial in Iasi). At the request addressed to the Ministry of Culture that he receives first the regulation of the competition, he did not receive any answer. As personal reasons prevented him afterwards to participate, he declined the invitation. However, the competition was organized with an incomplete number of juries (even number of members), and Matei Bejenaru was announced as member of the jury in the public announcement of the results.