Radio România Internațional

Category: World of Culture

  • Ana Ularu in the new Netflix Production Tribes of Europe

    Ana Ularu in the new Netflix Production Tribes of Europe

    In late February, Netflix premiered the series Tribes of Europe, a fantasy saga starring Ana Ularu. She is well known as an actress, with almost 50 film roles under her belt, many of them international successes starring, among others, Keanu Reeves, in Siberia, Tom Hanks, in Inferno, Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence, in Serena. Here she plays a warrior in a fierce tribe, in German director Philip Kochs vision of the future, more to the point the year 2074, 45 years from a catastrophe that turns Europe into the stage for a merciless fight for survival and freedom.




    Ana Ularu auditioned for her part in Tribes of Europe while she was filming Alex Rider, the thriller produced by Eleventh Hour Films and Sony Pictures Television, launched in Romania late last year, distributed by AXN. According to her, the first condition for building a credible character is to like the script and believe in the story. Here she is talking about it:


    “In the end, that choice has to do with my tastes as a member of the audience, of consumer of quality cinema and television. I have to feel that the project is to my taste, that it could challenge me enough to go in for an audition, because I obviously dont expect to get every part I audition for. I am fairly picky, I only go for the projects that challenge me, because it is very important for me to believe in the story. Sometimes I dont believe in the story, or I dont think its well structured to the end, or I think it is a topic that is treated superficially, or even in an offending manner, and so Id rather I take myself off the list of casting choices. I am lucky that my agents are understanding, and believe in my choices. It is the same with the calls I get. I think that we, the actors, are tempted to keep on working, we have the freedom to choose and to say out loud that we dont believe a given project represents us. Some projects or stories are in line with our vision of the world, others contradict it. The ones that contradict it make no sense getting involved in. In the end, it is about my perspective as a member of the audience. The artist in me would like to get involved in projects that give me joy, and give joy to the audience in me. Then the choice is easy, I go for the movies I would like to watch myself.”




    Ana Ularu told us about filming Crotia and near Prague, in the Czech Republic, and about her character, Grieta:


    “Honor is what characterizes their tribe, the Crows, which has a very strong value system, like the samurais. These members of the tribe, who claim they never lie or cheat, have dedicated their lives to war and debauchery. And, in spite of their expansionist tendencies, they are fair. We are talking about very complex characters, and I can say this is what attracted me a lot, the world that Philip Koch has created, which is absolutely fascinating in its diversity. Each tribe has its features, and once in a while a character appears from another geographical area. To create such a saga, as a writer, appeals to the teenager you have nurtured in yourself. It is very pleasant to read the story. And if you have the opportunity to act in such a thing, it gives you even greater joy. As I said, the series is directed by Philip Koch, its creator, but a few episodes, the ones where my character is featured more prominently, are directed by Florian Baxmeyer, another wonderful director that I have worked with very well. The scenes were hard, but pleasant, as always. There can be very difficult conditions, extreme weather, long hours, unpredictable situations. For instance, we had a very long night of shooting, and from this point of view, life as an actor is a way of hardening yourself in the face of vicissitudes. But I think that is a good thing, we have strong immunity. In addition, I noticed a sort of unwritten rule, that the action in the film never matches the season in which you are shooting. In Inferno, directed by Ron Howard, I happened to have to wear a woolen uniform and wool lined gloves, and we were in Florence in May and June. In the movie Periferic, on the last day of shooting, it was minus 12 degrees in February, but the story had me in the summer, and I was wearing a T-shirt.”




    The part she played in the 2010 movie Periferic, directed by Bogdan George Apetri brought Ana Ularu the Boccalino award, the Swiss film critics award for best actress at the Locarno International Film Festival, the best female performance at the festivals in Salonika and Novi Sad, and a special mention at the Warsaw International Film Festival. For that same part, Ana Ularu got the Gopo Award, and the award for best actress in the Shooting Stars program, dedicated to the 10 most talented young European actors at the 2012 Berlinale. One of her first leading roles was in The Italians, made in 2004 by Napoleon Helmis. Then came Turkey Girl, by Cristian Mungiu, the collective film Lost and Found, Radu Munteans The Paper Will Be Blue, and Youth Without Youth by Francis Ford Coppola. She also played major roles in the movies I Am a Communist Crone, by Stere Gulea, A Very Unstable Summer, by Anca Damian, On the Road with Dad, by Ana Miruna Lazarescu, and Charleston, by Andrei Cretulescu.

  • Making Waves – New Romanian cinema

    Making Waves – New Romanian cinema

    Now in its 15th year, Making Waves, the
    longest-running festival dedicated to new Romanian cinema to be held in America,
    took place at the end of February in an online-only format. The event is produced
    and curated by Corina Șuteu, Mihai Chirilov and Oana Radu, the same team who
    initiated the festival back in 2006. Here’s Mihai Chirilov, the festival’s
    artistic director:




    We had to rethink the festival this year. Every year,
    we used to fly over to the US Romanian film makers and actors to meet the American
    public, and every screening would be followed by talks with the spectators. We usually
    showed 7 productions, over the course of one week. This year, because the
    online format allowed us more flexibility, we also included six short films alongside
    the standard seven feature films. The advantage of online screening is that the
    films were available to watch not only by the New York public, as has been the
    case in previous editions, but by the entire American public. We were talking
    about this with our friends at Jacob Burns Film Center, the festival’s traditional
    partners, who were surprised that the films had so many views. The films were available
    to watch based on a pass valid for all productions and the conclusion is that
    both our partners at Jacob Burns Film Center and we are very happy that the
    films reached so many American spectators. The festival managed to create its
    own public, especially in New York, made up of both American film lovers
    interested in Romanian cinema and Romanians living in the US who want to catch up
    with the latest Romanian productions. The key to our success is constancy. The
    festival went through a challenging period, then re-created itself as an
    independent project funded by donations. And the donations from the American
    public only make this public more loyal. The fact that we were able to reach a
    wider geographical area this year was beneficial for the festival. Before this
    edition, Making Waves used to take place in New York, in well-known screening
    venues, with the exception of 2019 when we celebrated the 30th
    anniversary of the Revolution of 1989 and when we had a bigger line-up of 30 films,
    titles that have made history in these last 30 years, and which were screened
    to various other cities around America, as well.




    Malmkrog
    by Cristi Puiu, Legacy by Dorian Boguţă, The Campaign by Marian
    Crişan, Ivana the Terrible by Ivana Mladenovic, House of Dolls by
    Tudor Platon, My Home by Radu Ciorniciuc and Collective by Alexander
    Nanau were the titles shown as part of the Making Waves festival this year. This
    was a great year for Romanian documentary film-making, especially those titles
    exploring social issues, with both Collective and My Home earning
    impressive international recognition – which is why they opened and ended this
    year’s edition of Making Waves, wrote critic Mihai Chrilov.




    Apart from being included on the Oscars’ shortlist this
    year in two different categories, Alexander Nanau’s documentary Collective
    is considered by the international press as one of the best films about
    journalism ever made. Mihai Chirilov, the artistic director of the Making Waves
    film festival explains:




    Every year when we select the lineup for the festival
    we try to include productions and film makers who already ring familiar in America.
    We did the same this year. Choosing Alexander Nanau’s Collective to open
    the festival came naturally. It was the most visible title in America and beyond,
    winning extremely good reviews ever since it was first launched at the Toronto
    festival in 2019. And the pandemic took nothing away from the film’s reputation
    and impact, with the film winning an Oscar nomination. So, it was only natural
    to honour the film’s success in America and show it in the opening of the
    festival. We also hope to increase its visibility as we’re coming closer to the
    final decision of the American Film Academy.




    Apart from films, the festival also featured
    interviews with actor Irina Rădulescu and directors Marian Crișan, Tudor Platon
    and Ivana Mladenović.

  • Mirrors of Brancusi

    Mirrors of Brancusi

    19 February is Brancusi Day, dedicated to great Romanian modernist sculptor Constantin Brancusi, born in the village of Hobita, Gorj County, southwestern Romania. All over the world, he is considered the father of contemporary sculpture. Some of his most famous works are Miss Pogany, Prayer, Maiastra, and the sculpture ensemble in Targu Jiu, with its famous Endless Column, The Gate of the Kiss, and the Table of silence. The sculptor passed away in 1957 in Paris, then the cultural capital of the world. Brancusi was born 145 years ago, and he is still the subject of countless studies and exhibitions. Such an exhibition is Mirrors of Brancusi, hosted by the Romanian Peasant Museum.




    We spoke about it to Virgil Nitulescu, the manager of the museum:


    “I have a hard time pinning down the translation of the name of the exhibition, because the original title is in English, Mirrors of Brancusi. The exhibition was born out of Romanias endeavor to take part in the great cultural event in Brussels, Belgium, called Europalia, which our county attended with great success, especially with the exhibition called The Sublimation of Form, curated by our great Brancusi expert, Ms. Doina Lemny, at the Museum of Modern Art in Paris. The idea was born to bring Brancusi here, with means of exhibiting easier to handle for todays youth, with multimedia installations, easier to digest for a cosmopolitan audience, generally very young, like the audience in Brussels, practically the capital of the European Union. This project was then submitted to the Ministry of Culture as part of the RO-cultura program, with support from grants offered by the European Norway — Iceland — Liechtenstein program, the now famous Norwegian funds. It also obtained the necessary funding through a direct partnership with a Norwegian association. The Romanian Peasant Museum is the first museum in Romania, the first institution in Romania, to host this exhibition.”




    Using new technologies, and reinterpreting better or lesser known works by the famous artist, the exhibition is a dynamic display of happenings in Brancusis life, his relationship with artists of his time, as well as features of his character that are not largely known. The organizers hope that visitors will gain new knowledge about the sculptor. The project is based on research done on a wide sample of people, which concluded that collectively, people have a different impression of the artist from what he wanted to express. In order to change this, the designers of the project used the idea of interactivity and technology in the creative process. The ample exhibition immerses the spectator in Brancusis work, giving them the possibility of exploring a true to life depiction of the Endless Column, along with a short film dedicated to the life of the inventor of modern sculpture, with brief, hand picked information.




    Exhibition curator Silvana Dulama-Popa said:


    “For this project, we followed a logical line where we blended concepts in |Brancusis work with the needs of the audience, the way in which they interact with information and assimilate it. This was the birth of the Mirrors of Brancusi concept, a mirror project, where people are not just presented with Brancusis work, but are invited to put themselves in the place of certain works by the artist, being able to analyze their own emotions and feelings from a new position.”




    National Peasant Museum director Virgil Nitulescu shared a few thoughts about the possible interaction of the audience, who may know more or less about the artists work:


    “This is not an exhibition involving Brancusis work as such, because they are very rare in Romania. You can only find them at the National Art Museum of Romania, and at the Oltenia Art Museum in Craiova. However, with this particular exhibition, we can access his universe, trying to understand his work, not from an expert perspective, because it is meant for the public at large, less prepared for a higher understanding of the roots of Brancusis work, referred to as the inventor of modern sculpture. This is meant to put into context Brancusis work, not only for Romania, but for the world of 2021. I myself am happy that, with this exhibition, efforts are being made to bring the works of Constantin Brancusi closer to the regular audience, which doesnt frequent museums, but which may be interested in cultural events to shed a contemporary light on a classic body of work.”

  • Romania’s art market in 2020

    Romania’s art market in 2020


    What were the performances of the art and collectible objects market in Romania in 2020? RRI talked to Alina Panico, PR Manager with the A10 by Artmark, about the most important auction houses and art transactions, about trends in the market and about the most sought-after Romanian fine artists:



    Alina Panico: “Operating in Romanias art market are 5 auction houses: A10 by Artmark, Alice, Quadro, Historic and Vicart. If we were to make an arithmetic means of the top 10 auction sales in 2020, we get an average of 116,250 euro. Compared to the figure for 2019, the difference is not substantial: about negative 2.36%, but in terms of the total market volume, preliminary data point to an approx. 20% increase in 2020 of the number and value of auction sales compared to 2019. Most of the Romanian art auctions involved heritage items, especially works by national “classics. The year 2020 brought a new all-time record for the Romanian art market: the painting “Peasant Woman with Distaff by Nicolae Grigorescu was sold for 220,000 euro. The national painter Nicolae Grigorescu is followed by great masters Ștefan Luchian and Nicolae Tonitza, whose works “Vase with carnations and “Irina sold for 125,000 Euro and 120,000 euro respectively. Heritage art was followed in 2020 by contemporary art, where the record was set by “untitled (memory) by the most sought-after Romanian artist internationally, Adrian Ghenie. His work was sold for 110,000 euro in 27 steps taking 10 minutes and 42 seconds, from an opening price of 20,000 euros.



    We also asked Alina Panico about the art authentication process. How certain can buyers be about a work of art that they purchase?



    Alina Panico: “Several aspects are taken into account in authenticating a painting: the themes, canvas, colour scheme, brush strokes, references in the media of the time or in exhibition catalogues. Collectibles are also certified by experts authorised by the Culture Ministry and qualified in various areas, such as fine art or decorative art. Expert reports look for more information than the artists signature. Subsequently, a qualified appraiser will tell us the financial value of that particular art work in the market. Only after taking all these steps can buyers be 100% certain of the authenticity of the works they intend to purchase.



    Alina Panico also told us about the profile of the art buyer in Romania, about collectors and the Romanian record in last years art market:



    Alina Panico: “We have smart and educated buyers, who continue to purchase art not only for its cultural value, but also as a financial instrument to preserve their savings at a time of great uncertainty. When you keep your savings in art works, you expect at the end of a crisis to get back at least the same amount of money you have invested. We have buyers who prefer an exclusively online platform, and given this years context, which encouraged the transfer of all art sales online, the number of active accounts opened by art collectors or investors tripled in a matter of months. We also have buyers who embrace the charity causes that we promote, and in 2020 we had as many as 6 charity auctions. If we take into account the doubling of the number of charity auctions in a year that has confused and tried all of us, and the 20% increase in transactions involving art works and collectible objects, the conclusion that may surprise many of us is that at difficult times many Romanians made a clear choice to support fundamental and long-standing values like art, cultural identity, national history and charity. There is no official standings of art collectors in Romania, but we could say that over the past few years people have come to understand that keeping art works in ones home is not necessarily conditional on substantial incomes. Romanians have started to purchase collectible objects, art works with medium financial costs. But in 2020 the record was set by the internationally acclaimed Romanian contemporary artist Adrian Ghenie, whose work in the “Lidless Eye series, deconstructing Van Goghs portrait, was sold by Sothebys in Hong Kong for more than 5 million euro. Ghenie also holds the second, third and fourth places in this top, with works sold at Sothebys or Christies for 2 to 4 million euro.



    At the end of our talk, Alina Panico drew a few conclusions on the year 2020 in the Romanian art market:



    Alina Panico: “So 2020 stayed on the upward trend that took shape in the Romanian art market a few years ago. With spectacular increases similar to those seen in previous years, 2020 was a year when players in the art market focused on setting new records and unexpected market increases, on finding an alternative market to invest their money, and art was a highly stable option compared to banks, for instance. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • Young Romanian novelists in Spain

    Young Romanian novelists in Spain

    The Spanish version of The summer when my mother’s
    eyes were green, a novel by Tatiana Tibuleac, brought out by the Impedimenta
    Publishers in 2019, scooped the Casino de Santiago European Novel Award.
    Spanish academic and writer Marian Ochoa de Eribe is the translator of the
    novel. Works by Eric Vuillard, Paolo Giordano and Pedro Feijo have also been
    included on the Award’s shortlist. Previously, recipients of the Casino de
    Santiago European Novel Award were Jonathan Coe, Kazuo Ishiguro, John
    Lanchester and Emmanuel Carrère. The summer when my mother’s eyes were green
    is the debut novel of Tatiana Țîbuleac, a former journalist in Chisinau and a
    current Paris resident. The Spanish version of the novel also scooped the Cálamo
    Award in 2019, a prize offered by the Cálamo bookshop in Zaragoza. Tatiana
    Tibuleac’s debut novel, its Romanian version, was launched in 2016. The novel
    focuses on the emotional relationship a mother has with her son. In 2019,
    Tatiana Tibuleac’s novel, The Glass garden, brought out by the Cartier
    Publishers in Chisinau in 2018, won the European Union’s Award for Literature.


    We sat down and spoke to the translator of « The
    summer when my mother’s eyes were green », Marian Ochoa de Eribe. Here she
    is, giving us details on the history behind the translation, on how the novel
    was received in the Hispanic space.

    Marian Ochoa de Eribe:

    « The story of the
    translation is absolutely wonderful. At the 2018 edition of the Madrid
    Bookfair, Romania was the guest country and I chaired the awarding ceremony,
    with Mircea Cartarescu attending. The ceremony was very beautiful. While the
    fair was still on, I ran into a newspaper that published an extensive article
    about present-day Romanian literature and I saw a couple of photos there. Save
    for two writers, I was familiar with all the authors that were presented in
    that publication. Tatiana Tibuleac was one of the authors that were presented
    in the article, I remember myself taking a picture of the article and sending
    it to a friend of mine at the University in Constanta, Dr Eta Hrubaru. I asked her if she knew anything at all about
    Tatiana Tibuleac, she replied she was in possession of Tatiana Tibuleac’s
    novel, «The Summer when My Mother’s Eyes were Green». So in early July, when I
    arrived in Constanta, the first thing I did was to read the novel, and the
    reading was extremely rewarding. I spoke about that on a number of occasions
    during the meetings I had with the press and with readers in Spain, telling
    them I finished reading the novel on the beach in Mamaia, and that as soon as I
    got home I started my PC, searching for a contact of Tatiana Tibuleac. I wrote
    a message and I let her know I was still under the spell of the book and I
    would like to translate it, I called Enrique Redel, the founder of the Impedimenta
    publishers. I told him I discovered a woman writer and I was going to translate
    The Summer when my mother’s eyes were green whether he was going to publish it
    or not. Enrique trusted me, and the outcome of
    that is this wonderful blazing trail of the book and this wonderful
    trail Tatiana Tibuleac had in the Hispanic world.


    Marian Ochoa de Eribe discovered Romanian literature
    in the 1990s when she was teaching comparative literature with Ovidius
    University in Constanta. The first Romanian books she translated into Spanish
    were Panait Istrati’s Kyra Kyralina and Moș Anghel,/Old man Anghel, as well as
    Mircea Eliade’s The Short-sighted Adolescent’s Novel. Since 2009, Marian Ochoa de Eribe has been translating the
    works of Mircea Cărtărescu, at the suggestion of Enrique Redel. The Impedimenta
    Publishers between 2010 and 2013 brought out Marian Ochoa de Eribe’s versions
    of Mircea Cartarescu’s The Roulette Player, Travesty, Nostalgia and Beautiful
    Strangers. The Spanish version of Cartarescu’s novel, Solenoid, was published in 2017
    and with that, Mircea Cartarescu compelled recognition in the Spanish cultural
    space, winning the prestigious Premio Formentor de las Letras in 2018.
    The Romanian was the recipient of one of the world’s most prestigious lifetime
    achievement literary awards, meant to give an impetus to the thoroughgoing
    transformation of human consciousness. »


    Marian Ochoa de Eribe is briefing us up on the works of Mircea Cărtărescu and Tatiana Țîbuleac, whose
    versions in Spanish she has recently completed.


    Marian Ochoa de Eribe:

    «Actually, I have never
    ceased to translate from Mircea Cartarescu, well…on and off, as of late I have
    been working on the Poetry Anthology which is due in autumn this year. To be
    honest with you, after I translated The Body, which is the second part of the Blinding
    trilogy, a very difficult book, what I needed was a little window, a little
    break, so that I could feel for some different stuff in the other drawers of my
    mind. But I won’t fail to say that Tatiana Tibuleac’s novel, The Glass Garden,
    was a difficult book, an extremely complex one, language-wise. Now, coming back
    to your question, it seems I cannot possibly take Mircea Cartarescu off my mind, it’s
    as if I had perpetually lived in his world and in his obsessions.»


    The Impedimenta publishers has recently announced Marian
    Ochoa de Eribe’s Spanish version of Tatiana Tibuleac’s second novel, The Glass
    Garden, is available in bookshops. Marian Ochoa de Eribe’s Spanish version of
    another Romanian novel is due out from Acantilado publishers in 2021, Gabriela
    Adamesteanu’s novel, Temporariness.






  • Romanian comedy

    Romanian comedy

    The Comedy Theater in Bucharest on January 5th
    extended an online invitation to all of us. Sixty years were celebrated since
    the theater had been established. We recall that back then the premiere was
    hosted on stage in Bucharest’s Old City Center. On the evening of January 5th,
    1962, a unique stage version of The Famous 702 was on, delighting the public of
    the theater that had been freshly founded at the heart of Bucharest    . The Famous 702 The play was stage-directed by
    director and professor with the Ion Luca Caragiale Drama and Film University
    in Bucharest, Moni Ghelerter. The author of the play was Alexandru Mirodan, who
    at that time was experiencing his career-best. The play focused on a topic
    which was fresh at that time: the case of famous gangster Caryl Chessman. The
    stage performance was a box office hit and was also critically acclaimed. In
    the time’s Contemporanul/The Contemporary newspaper, poet and journalist Tudor
    Arghezi wrote, QUOTE It is not only a theater that we’re opening, but, if you
    will, we’re also opening a university of humor and joy UNQUOTE.


    The legacy of the Comedy Theater in Bucharest is
    remarkable, including, among other stage performances, Moliere’s The Bourgeois
    Gentilhomme, premiered in 1962 and featuring Grigore Vasiliu Birlic, then it
    was The shadow directed by David Esrig, in 1963. Eugene Ionesco’s The
    Rhinoceros, in 1964, was also a highlight, it was a performance for which the
    author himself offered rounds of applause at the Théâtre des Nations in Paris.
    Gogol’s ‘Government Inspector’ directed by Horatiu Malaele, or ‘Zoika’s House’
    were among the Comedy Theater’s more recent accomplishments. We recall that
    actor George Mihaita scooped the UNITER’s award for best actor in a lead role,
    in 2010.


    Early into 2021, a stage performance, which is also a cultural
    endeavor, enjoyed a virtual presence at the Comedy Theater in Bucharest. It was
    an opportunity to be together, with the audience, first of all, alongside the
    friends of the theater, collaborators and people of the stage. It was a very special
    opportunity, about which we sat down and talked in the company of the manager
    of the Comedy Theater, actor George Mihaita.


    We can say that this year our
    preparedness was only online, unfortunately; if you followed us on the
    theater’s Facebook and Instagram pages you could have the clear image of a
    retrospective of the Comedy Theater, All the actors were involved in that. We
    began with a speech by the manager, I am not going to say who he is. Then we
    carried a couple of projects; we started several such projects: a documentary
    film about how the Comedy theater was established, its title is Comedia Remix,
    the project was carried by Cristina Modreanu și Maria Drăghici. Every now and
    then actors reminisced about their days in the theater, the first episode they
    had, of the funniest one. We spoke about the Comedy Theater’s inaugural stage
    performance, The Famous 702 featuring Radu Beligan, there is a recording of a
    little story told by Lamia Beligan, Radu Beligan’s daughter, she told us the
    bits and pieces she could remember. Also, we have the most recent performance,
    Far away across the field, directed by Alexandru Dabija. Then we had reading
    performances, for instance, made of the texts that in the last five years have
    been were awarded at the Romanian comedy contest, for some of the texts we have
    video footage, and that is how today, we can still have a Horia Garbea play,
    directed by Dragos Huluba, with some of the theater’s young actors on the cast.
    We have Theater Day Remember, we had a celebration of that day every year, but
    we celebrated the Comedy Theater on January 5, we also have footage of the
    previous years’ celebrations. We also had short video podcasts of personalities
    uttering their words of praise. There is another project we developed jointly
    with the National Museum of Romanian Literature, the great Romanian playwrights
    revisited, this is fairly original stuff, for instance, we begin with George
    Ciprian, with some of George’s stories, the original ones, read by Marius
    Florea Vizante and we shall carry on like that in the coming months, with other
    Romanian playwrights, the likes of Mazilu, Musatescu, Baiesu.


    The video materials can be revisited of the Comedy
    Theater’s Facebook page, where other materials will also be posted, as the
    online communication is the only one we can have in the trying times we have
    been going through because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Here is Comedy theater
    manager, actor George Mihaita, once again. He will now be saying something
    about what they have in store for 2021 and what projects are pending, ready to
    be brought to the limelight of the virtual stage or, perhaps, the proper stage,
    located in the Capital’s Old City Center. George Mihaita

    In November we already had one,
    titled ‘A Chekhov Workshop’, directed by Vlad Massaci who used some of
    Chekhov’s short stories, a coupe performance, so to speak, with most of the
    theater’s actors on the cast. We also keep our hopes high for better days so
    that we can start our stage rehearsals in larger groups and continue with D’Ale
    carnavalului/Only during a carnival, the work began in February last year,
    it is directed by Vlad Cristache, with the theater’s young actors on the cast,
    and we do hope we will sort of break a leg with that. What comes to mind, for
    the time being, is that money is still tight, and we understand that, and then
    we thought that the director of the theater, Massaci, or the other actors,
    Mihai Bendeac, for instance, whose stage versions of Krechinsky’s wedding,
    but also of Two on a bench, were extremely successful, he featured in
    both shows, so we thought that they can yet again can come up with something
    which is hopefully at least as good as what they have done so far. There is no
    other way, we shall step up our online projects. Just as we did in spring. Once
    again, I felt, through my colleagues, mostly the younger ones, I felt they were
    even sadder because they were not doing their job on stage. It is a great
    sadness, as it is on stage that we exist, and if we don’t get spotted from
    there, that is something very delicate, it is very difficult for us. We have no
    other choice. Those who are listening right now, they should come to the
    theater, as seeing each other face-to-face is one thing, and just talking, that
    is something totally different, it’s just like a monologue on the radio. But I
    think it’s good we can say each other hello, well, considering…We get to know
    something about each other.




  • Romanian theater in the time of the pandemic

    Romanian theater in the time of the pandemic

    Romanian theater has been seriously
    affected by the restrictions imposed during the pandemic, so much so that it
    had to find alternative ways to reach out to the usual stage audience.
    Performances could no longer be held outdoors, so the online environment was
    the support that enabled theater lovers to watch the actors on stage.


    The day of September 21,
    2020, 22:30, Bucharest Time, was another turning point in Romanian theater’s
    activity. We’re speaking about the moment of the UNITER Gala’s 28th
    edition. Initially scheduled for the spring of 2020, the even was postponed
    until the autumn equinox. In 2020, the UNITER Gala was held the southern
    Romanian city of Craiova. It marked 170 years since the Marin Sorescu theater
    had been founded in Craiova, and was venued by the outdoor Summer Theater in
    Craiova’s Nicolae Romanescu park. Radio Romania’s Culture Channel offered a
    live broadcast of the Gala, which could also be followed online, at www.tvr.ro and www.uniter.ro.


    T

    he main organizer and initiator of the Gala was the
    National Union of Romanian Theaters, UNITER. It is a professional, apolitical,
    nongovernmental and non-profit organization, which was set up through the free
    association of creators in the field of Romanian theater. It was established in
    February 1990, so in 2020 UNITER celebrated its three decades of existence.
    Since September 10, 2020, UNITER has launched the video promotion of the
    artists who were nominated for the awards. Of course, several nominations were
    made based on the previous year’s achievements, according to the regulations.
    Since September 14, all viewers could support their favorites, casting their
    vote on www.uniter.ro


    It may have been the venue of the event, or the
    restrictions that have been imposed in 2020, in other words, it was the triumph
    of creativity over fear…all that put together bestowed a special power on the
    UNITER Gala in 2020.

    Theater critic and UNITER
    member Oana Cristea Grigorescu:


    The UNITER Galas have succeeded to
    change something, have rooted out that kind of conservatism in the way the Gala
    has been organized in the last 20 years. Everybody sensed, first of all, a
    reshuffle of the format, which occurred not only due to the fact that the event
    was staged on outdoor premises, in Craiova…I believe all that was possible
    especially because of the trust the organizers put in the two producers of the
    Gala, stage director Bobi Pricop and stage designer Irina Moscu. An entire team
    backed them and everybody sensed the life-giving wind for this event…And we
    also fed ourselves with a dose of optimism provided by the way the Gala
    unfolded – concisely, and in a clean manner. There was also something else,
    maybe the most important aspect. Some of the welcome speeches of the awardees
    tackled an important issue. In Romanian culture, at least formally, but mainly
    from an organizing point of view, there is a rift between the independent
    artiss and the artists coming from subsidized institutions. The rift is false,
    and the welcome speeches at the UNITER Gala focused on the very specific idea
    whereby it was about time we found administrative solutions to support the
    deserving independent artists. That should be done in such a way as to
    acknowledge their contribution to the diversity of theater stage. At the end of
    the Gala, the president of UNITER and the manager of the National Theater in
    Bucharest, Ion Caramitru, pledged that solutions would be found to support
    independent theater. And that is a point of strategic importance. It is a type
    of cultural policy UNITER vowed to implement henceforth.


    The 30th edition of the National Theater
    Festival in Bucharest was held over November 22 and 29, 2020. The event was
    also a premiere. We followed it online, at fnt.ro. The three personalities who
    stage-directed and provided the selection of the program had a clear-cut
    intention: that of setting up a dialogue between the aesthetics of yesterday’s
    creators and the present-day artistic quest. Radio Romania is one of the
    event’s traditional partners, hence the label of the festival’s; special
    section, FNT ON AIR. One of the event’s three driving forces was provided by
    Maria Zărnescu, an associate professor with Bucharest University of Drama and
    Film.

    Maria Zarnescu:


    Each of the posted events will be
    there for 48 hours, they will be available for revisiting if somebody so
    wishes. It is, so to speak, crowded, since we wanted to revisit the festival’s
    past, its three decades, that is. And we sometimes discovered remarkable acting
    recitals. And that, in close connection with the actor-stage
    director-playwright three-way relationship. When the stuff we discovered was
    shorter, we put all that together in a special section, labeled ‘The Great
    Actor’s Art.’ The section lays emphasis on actors who are very popular with the
    Romanian audience, yet all the creators involved in the artistic pursuit are no
    less important.


    There were, of course, noteworthy international guest
    performances presented as part of the FNT, Festivalul National de Teatru/the
    National Theater Festival in Bucharest. Added to all that were the pandemic
    productions, such as ZOOM BIRTHDAY PARTY, based on a text by Saviana Stănescu,
    directed by Beth Milles (SUA) or POOL (NO WATER) by Mark Ravenhill, a project
    carried by Radu Nica, Andu Dumitrescu and Vlaicu Golcea.


    Romania’s stage artists were genuinely capable of
    finding solutions to analyze the present and their condition, in forms that
    would keep them connected to society, to its problems. Stage artists were also
    capable of coming up with solutions, simpler or more complex. Some of these
    solutions have already proved their feasibility. Perhaps they will make the new
    landmarks in Romanian performing arts as well.

  • New releases by the Casa Radio Publishers

    New releases by the Casa Radio Publishers

    Casa Radio Publishing House has added fresh titles, most of them launched in late 2020, during the International Book Fair Gaudeamus staged by Radio Romania. A collection entitled the Romanian Poetry Library has included a book and CD under the title “There was a time when I used to tell you all as well as an anthology of poetry by Emil Brumaru, one of Romanias most important and popular contemporary poets. “Language is one of the main qualities of Brumarus poetry, a ludic and complex poet, exploiting like no other the huge potential of the Romanian vocabulary says critic Marius Chivu.



    The poems included in this anthology were read by poet Emil Brumaru for Radio Romania in 2002 in a series of recordings made by journalist Emil Buruiana. The volume also includes an interview made by Eugen Lucan for Radio Romania Culture in 2001, texts signed by critics Cosmin Ciotlos and Bogdan Cretu as well as writers Veronica D. Niculescu and Serban Foarta with graphic illustrations by Zamfira Zamfirescu. The “Radio-Prichindel (Radio-Toddler) collection through which the Radio Publishing House has made available pages of great literature to children, read by the leading figures of radio theatre, has launched several audiobooks, such as Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, The Extraordinary Voyages of Sindbad the Sailor and the Humpbacked Horse. Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves is a graphic novel by Alexandru Ciubotariu adjusted for radio by Marin Traian.



    A radio recording dating back to 1965, with several remarkable actors, like Stefan Mihăilescu-Brăila, Nicolae Gărdescu, Mircea Constantinescu, Marian Hudac, The Extraordinary Voyages of Sindbad the Sailor has been graphically illustrated by Cristiana Călin, with a radio script signed by Marin Traian. The show was recorded by Radio Romania in 1969, with famous actor Fory Etterle as Sindbad the Sailor. Also a graphic novel, The Humpbacked Horse has benefitted from illustrations by Octavian Curoșu with a script by Victor Frunză after the famous Russian story. The CD includes a remarkable Radio Romania recording from 1964, with famous Romanian actors like Nicolae Gărdescu, Dumitru Furdui and Marin Moraru.



    Ligia Necula with the Casa Radio Publishing House has also told us about other fresh launches at the International Book Fair Gaudeamus: “I will be talking about the ‘star collection, as we call it, ‘Good night, children!, to which we managed to add two more volumes. There are two volumes with 7 stories each, read by the most appreciated voices in the radio archive. You will hear in these audiobooks the voices of great Romanian actors such as Octavian Cotescu, Leopoldina Bălănuță, Ștefan Mihăilescu-Brăila, Alexandrina Halic and Liliana Tomescu. As many of our listeners already know, the actors in this collection are the ones who brought to life the unforgettable stories which the past generations used to listen to, but we are sure that we can all return to these fairy tales of the world, from India, China, Africa, Mongolia, Canada, Latvia, and so on. I would also like to mention the release of an audiobook which many of those who follow us were waiting for, Luceafărul- the Morning Star. This is a CD that I believe will bring joy to many readers and radio listeners, but also to theater lovers. I could say that this release is quite an event because you will have the opportunity to listen to three actors from different generations who come up with various interpretations of the famous poem by Romanias greatest poet Mihai Eminescu. These actors are George Vraca, Ion Caramitru and Ada Condeescu. I think that this audiobook with various interpretations of the poem Luceafărul could be a tool for the teachers of Romanian language and literature.



    Ligia Necula also told us about the new releases in the music collections of Casa Radio publishers, namely Jazz forum, Radio Romania Music, Performances profile, Dowry box, Masters of choral art.



    Ligia Necula: “Since weve already talked about the collections dedicated to children, I will first mention the anniversary album ‘Oh, what joy! which marks the 75th anniversary of the Radio Children’s Choir. Imago Mundi, Isvor. Cantemir, Enescu, Brâncuși is another new release, in which the Imago Mundi Instrumental Ensemble brings together, in a generous music album, three CDs devoted to some outstanding personalities of the Romanian culture. We have also released a CD that includes famous pieces by Tchaikovsky and Dvořák performed by Cristian Măcelaru and the National Radio Orchestra. Alexandru Tomescu returns to Casa Radio publishers with a CD entitled Concerto, in which he performs Mozart, Saint-Saëns and Dvořák, alongside the National Radio Orchestra, conducted by Cristian Măcelaru and Tiberiu Soare. And since 2020 was the Beethoven year, we dedicated to the composer a CD with the 5th and 7th Symphonies performed by the National Radio Orchestra, conducted by Horia Andreescu and Cristian Măcelaru. In the end, Ill be talking about jazz, and I can say that the CD ‘Night and day featuring Luiza Zan and the Radio Big Band conducted by Ionel Tudor enjoyed great success. (tr. D. Bilt&L. SiImion)


  • The Film Marona’s Fantastic Journey

    The Film Marona’s Fantastic Journey

    The movie Marona’s Fantastic Journey, by Anca Damian, was nominated for the 2021 Lumieres Awards for Best Animation Motion Picture and Best Soundtrack. The awards are granted by the Academie des Lumieres, whose members are the members of the foreign press in Paris, the equivalent of the Golden Globes for the French film industry. The ceremony will be on January 21, and will be broadcast on the French television channel CANAL+. Marona’s Fantastic Journey, a Romanian-French-Belgian production, the third feature length animation by Anca Damian. It is a modern fairy tale about unconditional love and sacrifice. The script is by Anghel Damian, based on an idea by Anca Damian. The Belgian ilustrator Brecht Evens is the creator of the characters. The movie tells the tale of a puppy with a heart-shaped nose that has many adventures in a magical world. Actress Olimpia Melinte voices Marona. Marona’s Fantastic Journey was selected for over 30 major festivals, being nominated for the European feature length animation category of the European Film Academy Awards. The movie won the special jury prize at the Los Angeles Animation Film Festival for its ‘visual artistry and emotional impact’, and the grand prize and audience prize at the 21st edition of the International Animation Film Festival (BIAF) in Korea. Marona’s Fantastic Journey ran for the Oscars in 2019, one of 32 entries. Here is Anca Damian:



    “The movie premiered at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival in June 2019. I can say that many were amazed, because they didn’t expect a movie about a family of dogs to have such visual freedom, to convey such emotion, and have such a profound message. I think that there was a sort of delay in receiving the profound message of the movie, because it is disguised as a family movie with a puppy as the main character. It is true that it is a special movie, even if we think of the language specific to animation movies. I hope that this movie will have a long life, especially since it was acquired by an international distributor for 20 years. As for the favorable reception of the film, I can say that was a huge surprise for me. I had a fear, since this is an atypical movie, with a special language, related to the was in which it would be received, because the audience has to have more availability for movies that are not mainstream. One of the most difficult lessons for me is that step that has to be taken during the distribution stage, meaning the things that you have to do for the message of the movie to reach the audience, so that everyone wants to see it.


    Marona’s Fantastic Journey is, in director Anca Damian’s vision, a ‘philosophical story of happiness, love, and life. It is a story that is based on a real event. Here is Anca Damian:



    “It happened one day when I was walking my dog. Marona the puppy started following us, and I couldn’t leave her out in the street, I found a family to adopt her. We have to admit that we, as a society, are not interested in animal rescue, we don’t have the necessary education to realize that they need our help. Getting back to Marona’s story, I couldn’t leave her in the street, I would have felt very guilty if I hadn’t rescued her. I only offered hera shelter, I helped materially a bit, but she gave me a priceless gift, she game me a lot of love, a love that gave birth to this movie. In general, when I start working on a movie, I always get inspiration from real life. However, the vision generated at the real moment includes a much wider arch about the meaning of life, because I myself am on my own journey, and I believe one’s entire life is an inititation. And in making this film, Marona’s Fantastic Journey, I realized that the only thing we have to learn is to pay attention to the present moment and to love. It is the only way to be happy. As for the reception, I am impressed that people from far away places, such as South America, Japan, or Canada, write me messages on Facebook. It is clearly an emotional reaction that makes them want to share, when coming out of the theater, the delight to have watched the movie, and that means a great deal to me, for the movie to reach the audience. Because that is the reason I make movies in the first place, for the audience.




    Anca Damian, one of the most innovative contemporary Romanian directors, with dozens of international awards under her belt, initially was a director of photography. In 2008, she made her first author movie, the fiction feature length film Cross Meetings. That was followed by the 2011 docudrama Crulic – The Way to Beyond, winner of the Le Cristal d’Annecy prize. They were followed by A Very Unstable Summer (2013), The Magic Mountain (2015), Perfectly Healthy (2016), Moon Kabul Hotel, which got the Best Director Award at the Warsaw International Film Festival, and the short movies Carre (2016), and Telephone (2018). They all enjoyed critical acclaim, and competed in major international film festivals, among them those in Pusan, Chicago, Goteborg, Cottbus, Locarno, London, Annecy, Toronto, Goa, Rome, Warsaw, and Copenhagen.

  • Works by Louise Glück to be part of the ANANSI collection

    Works by Louise Glück to be part of the ANANSI collection

    At a very difficult time for the book market, when numerous publishing houses have downsized or even seized book printing due to a dramatic drop in sales, Pandora M Publishing House, part of TREI editorial group, is working on a collection of translations from universal literature. The collection, entitled ANANSI. World Fiction is being coordinated by Bogdan-Alexandru Stanescu, a writer and one of the most appreciated Romanian editors, with a 15-year experience in the field of literary translation. The new collection that bears the name of Anansi, the African god of stories, is made up of five series, namely, one dedicated to contemporary literature, one dedicated to the 20th century classics, one of literary essays, one of memoirs and one dedicated to poetry. Among the writers who form part of this collection are the Syrian Samar Yazbek, a fervent critic of the Assad regime, the Swedish Linda Boström Knausgård, the American writer, poet and literary critic Ben Lerner, a Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, Ahmet Altan, one of the most read Turkish writers and an outstanding journalist, all of them translated into Romanian for the first time.



    Bogdan Alexandru Stanescu tells us more about the ANANSI collection: Many editors dream of something like this, wish to coordinate such collection, but they often fail to find the support they need. The fact that the first six titles of the collection are sold out is a surprise for me as well. The novelty and quality of the titles surely mattered, as well as the graphics, the covers signed by Andrei Gamart. I would call this a rather subjective collection. I included authors that I like a lot and whom I wanted to see translated into Romanian. I could not bear the thought that Jose Luis Peixoto, one of the greatest contemporary Portuguese writers, dubbed by critics the new Saramago, has not been fully translated into Romanian. I remember that at a certain point there was a Facebook group that tried to convince publishing houses to further translate his books. And still, this didn’t happen. So it’s not a coincidence that Jose Luis Peixoto was included in the first wave of the Anansi collection with his book ’Autobiography ’, translated by Simina Popa, and for me this is a dream come true. Also, it was hard for me to understand why Martin Amis, one of the most influential and innovative voices of British contemporary literature was not being translated. In the case of Paul Auster, I must admit this is my favourite of all his books – ’Moon Palace’, translated by Michaela Niculescu. I believe the role of a publishing house is also to educate the taste of readers. I do not think is right not to have masterpieces in our libraries because they were translated and published 20 years ago and reediting is seen as not having any sense. Unfortunately, many people in the book industry do not understand the value of reediting. Its purpose is to keep on the market and among the readers’options, a number of masterpieces. This is how the reediting of ’I, Claudius’, a historical novel by Robert Graves, translated by Silvian Iosifescu, is justified.



    The most awaited come back in Romanian poetry, this is how literary critic Mihai Iovanel describes the poetry book of Ruxandra Novac, published as part of the Anansi collection : Ruxandra Novac is, in a way, the reason behind the Anansi Blues poetry series. I say this because when we decided to publish this poetry book, entitled ’Alwarda’, the collection was almost fully sketched. It was when we decided to publish Ruxandra Novac’s volume that we thought of a series devoted entirely to poetry. Starting this year, we will publish the work of the 2020 Nobel Prize winner in literature, Louise Gluck. When the award was announced, many people said on social networks that they had never heard of her, although she has been a heavy name of the American poetry in the last 50 years. I promise more people will hear of Louise Gluck in Romania as well.



    Also part of the Anansi collection are volumes that won the world’s most important literature prizes in 2020, such as L’Anomalie, that brought French writer Hervé Le Tellier the Goncourt Prize, the book of Maggie O’Farrell, that brought her the Women’s Prize for Fiction, the novel The Discomfort of Evening, by Dutch writer Marieke Lucas Rijneveld, awarded with The International Booker Prize, and also Shuggie Bain, the debut novel of the Scottish writer Douglas Stuart, that won the The Booker Prize 2020.



  • Cultural Consumption During the Pandemic

    Cultural Consumption During the Pandemic

    According to the study entitled ‘Cultural Consumption Trends during the Pandemic’, run by the National Institute for Cultural Research and Training, in 2020 Romanians read more books, listened to more music, watched more movies, TV, and documentaries, and consumed more online or outdoors theater plays.




    According to the study, there was an increase in the percentage of people who read more books and listened to more music. In 2020, 35% of respondents said they read books as opposed to 22% in 2019. In 2020, 88% of respondents said they listened to music on all kinds of devices, as opposed to 74% in 2019. Theater and cinema going went down due to health restrictions, but Romanians were interested in watching theater plays and movies online, or to go to outdoor shows, restrictions and weather permitting. In 2020, 79% of respondents watched movies and TV series, versus 76% in 2019, more animation movies, 40% versus 31%, variety shows, 76% versus 69%, and children’s shows, 38% versus 25%.




    Speaking about the need that Romanians have for culture, emphasizing the appetite of Bucharesters for cultural and social event, is Adrian Majuru, director of the Municipal Museum of Bucharest:


    “Humans are social animals. They consume culture even when they don’t intend that, they culturally formatted their entire lives, and that includes their work. What I didn’t know was the way they consume it, and how they get culturally re-formatted when under pressure, such as health insecurity, which is not visible, or an economic or social crisis with street riots, for instance, which are sometimes predictable, and are visible, and then you can draw conclusions in real time. In principle, people recovered dormant preoccupations, such as reading or communicating on forums.




    We asked Adrian Majuru how the museums in the capital city have adapted with distancing cultural consumption due to the pandemic:


    “Obviously, I am part of the generation that took the leap, I went from handwritten letters, on which I used to work three hours sometimes, with up to three drafts that you worked on, to messages that you type, with words that you don’t even intend writing. As a result, we used technology in all its aspects to develop communication with anyone, even unknown people, who then become known. We have transformed the 15 Facebook pages of the 10 museums and 5 collection that don’t appear in cultural magazines. Our good luck is that the Municipal Museum of Bucharest has the most variety in its collection of all museums in the capital, we have coins, clothing, archaeology, we have art. All these collections started being very active online, with 3 postings a day, and during the pandemic we had over a million visitors in a month and a half, we had more comments, we hand more adjacent platforms, such as Instagram and Twitter. Then, when we opened again in May, we had a hard time recovering, with a drop of 70%, then we had a comeback, going up 50% compared to last year, but still having 30% less than in 2019. Of course it was a different kind of traffic, because people were worried about their safety, their jobs, which in some cases changed or disappeared. We wanted to offer a refuge, and tried to give an answer to people who were questioning their lives, as much as we could in a Facebook page or a forum, in a paragraph with pertinent value judgments, with proper references, meeting the needs of people who need more than cultural information. As far as I’m concerned, things are no longer going to be linear, there will be less and less money to go around, even from the state budget, and then your narrative expression needs to have interdisciplinary content, to come from different areas that touch as many people as possible.




    We also talked to the Municipal Museum of Bucharest director about the virtual offer of the museum, and what they intend to do for 2021. Here is what Adrian Majuru said:


    “We have a website that has all the possible drawers, more than many Western museums. We have drawers for everything, we have digitized movies from our collection, free of charge, documentaries we made about museums, about collections, about Bucharest. We have recorded conferences that had been posted live, with foreign guests, with very interesting topics. But planning means an anatomic expansion of this year for at least 6 months, maybe more. What we had as added value has to be recovered, meaning organizing events that brought in people, such as classical or contemporary music shows, theater plays, or many other ideas from the community. We had a call for projects this autumn, but we had very few proposals, even though we provided our space free of charge. We are talking also about exhibitions, but we only had a few requests for workshops or teaching events. Our main aims is to keep up with the community, understanding what its problems are.

  • Cultural Consumption During the Pandemic

    Cultural Consumption During the Pandemic

    According to the study entitled ‘Cultural Consumption Trends during the Pandemic’, run by the National Institute for Cultural Research and Training, in 2020 Romanians read more books, listened to more music, watched more movies, TV, and documentaries, and consumed more online or outdoors theater plays.




    According to the study, there was an increase in the percentage of people who read more books and listened to more music. In 2020, 35% of respondents said they read books as opposed to 22% in 2019. In 2020, 88% of respondents said they listened to music on all kinds of devices, as opposed to 74% in 2019. Theater and cinema going went down due to health restrictions, but Romanians were interested in watching theater plays and movies online, or to go to outdoor shows, restrictions and weather permitting. In 2020, 79% of respondents watched movies and TV series, versus 76% in 2019, more animation movies, 40% versus 31%, variety shows, 76% versus 69%, and children’s shows, 38% versus 25%.




    Speaking about the need that Romanians have for culture, emphasizing the appetite of Bucharesters for cultural and social event, is Adrian Majuru, director of the Municipal Museum of Bucharest:


    “Humans are social animals. They consume culture even when they don’t intend that, they culturally formatted their entire lives, and that includes their work. What I didn’t know was the way they consume it, and how they get culturally re-formatted when under pressure, such as health insecurity, which is not visible, or an economic or social crisis with street riots, for instance, which are sometimes predictable, and are visible, and then you can draw conclusions in real time. In principle, people recovered dormant preoccupations, such as reading or communicating on forums.




    We asked Adrian Majuru how the museums in the capital city have adapted with distancing cultural consumption due to the pandemic:


    “Obviously, I am part of the generation that took the leap, I went from handwritten letters, on which I used to work three hours sometimes, with up to three drafts that you worked on, to messages that you type, with words that you don’t even intend writing. As a result, we used technology in all its aspects to develop communication with anyone, even unknown people, who then become known. We have transformed the 15 Facebook pages of the 10 museums and 5 collection that don’t appear in cultural magazines. Our good luck is that the Municipal Museum of Bucharest has the most variety in its collection of all museums in the capital, we have coins, clothing, archaeology, we have art. All these collections started being very active online, with 3 postings a day, and during the pandemic we had over a million visitors in a month and a half, we had more comments, we hand more adjacent platforms, such as Instagram and Twitter. Then, when we opened again in May, we had a hard time recovering, with a drop of 70%, then we had a comeback, going up 50% compared to last year, but still having 30% less than in 2019. Of course it was a different kind of traffic, because people were worried about their safety, their jobs, which in some cases changed or disappeared. We wanted to offer a refuge, and tried to give an answer to people who were questioning their lives, as much as we could in a Facebook page or a forum, in a paragraph with pertinent value judgments, with proper references, meeting the needs of people who need more than cultural information. As far as I’m concerned, things are no longer going to be linear, there will be less and less money to go around, even from the state budget, and then your narrative expression needs to have interdisciplinary content, to come from different areas that touch as many people as possible.




    We also talked to the Municipal Museum of Bucharest director about the virtual offer of the museum, and what they intend to do for 2021. Here is what Adrian Majuru said:


    “We have a website that has all the possible drawers, more than many Western museums. We have drawers for everything, we have digitized movies from our collection, free of charge, documentaries we made about museums, about collections, about Bucharest. We have recorded conferences that had been posted live, with foreign guests, with very interesting topics. But planning means an anatomic expansion of this year for at least 6 months, maybe more. What we had as added value has to be recovered, meaning organizing events that brought in people, such as classical or contemporary music shows, theater plays, or many other ideas from the community. We had a call for projects this autumn, but we had very few proposals, even though we provided our space free of charge. We are talking also about exhibitions, but we only had a few requests for workshops or teaching events. Our main aims is to keep up with the community, understanding what its problems are.

  • The Toy Museum

    The Toy Museum

    The National History Museum of Romania (MNIR), in partnership with the Toy Museum Association, has prepared for the winter holidays period a special temporary exhibition which displays games, objects, old childhood photos, things that used to bring joy and smiles in the life and soul of each and every child. Around the 1960s, Romania had eight factories that produced wooden or tin objects, childrens books and toys such as the famous Tehno-Metalica Cooperative in Bucharest, the Oradea Plastics Factory and the Aradeanca Factory in Arad. At the exhibition of the National History Museum of Romania visitors can travel back in time admiring thousands of exhibits made in those factories and not only.



    Engineer Cristian Dumitru, the president of the Toy Museum Association told us more about the exhibition: “The exhibition is in full swing, it is developing and is being completed right here at the National History Museum. It is open as part of the museums regular program, at least until the end of the year people can definitely see this exhibition. The exhibition is based on my own collection, which I started in the 80s. Practically, in the 80s, all the boys, as far as I remember, used to collect something – from stamps to cars, to trains and planes. My brothers and I used to collect almost everything. Thus, we always had a large number of toys in the house, especially boys toys, a collection that we decided, back in the 80s, not only to keep, although we had grown, we were teenagers, but even to enrich it with other toys, from our friends or from bookstores. Gradually, at the end of the 80s we had a fairly large collection for that epoch. We were able to buy even more toys since the market was freer. We tried to collect toys from Romania, toys that brought happiness to many generations of kids. Nowadays, it is quite easy to buy old toys, there are so many facilities such as the Internet and online shopping, but all the toys in this exhibition are practically collected from fairs, from old house attics, from people who no longer need them, so this exhibition is a 100% mirror of the Romanian childhood of the past one hundred years. We had the first exhibitions organized 12 years ago and we were a little disappointed by the childrens reaction, because they could not resonate with such toys. Instead, we were quite delighted with the reaction of the parents or grandparents who saw their childhood toys. The most interesting thing to watch in an exhibition is the child-grandparent and child-parent interaction. The parent or grandparent describes or even shows the kid those childhood toys, and the kid understands that toys did not appear 10 years ago and that dolls were made even 100-150 years ago in about the same form. Kids thus come to understand that a jumping frog toy could be more than 100 years old.”



    We continued to talk to engineer Cristian Dumitru about the much larger collection of the Toy Museum and about how it has been made over the years.



    Cristian Dumitru: “As I have told you, the collection includes toys manufactured in Romania or that could be found in stores from Romania in the past 100 years. Probably the oldest toys date from around 1880-1890, at least those we were able to date, to find on the websites of those respective factories. Some are mechanical toys or even a small steam engine that became the engine for other toys in 1880, when it was manufactured. They are, perhaps, the first electric toys made between 1910-1920 or maybe the first remote control cars made in the 1960s and 1970s. There are many epochs and toys have evolved in the last one hundred years from a simple, static horse filled with straw 100 years ago, to the current toys that include many electronic components. Now it seems that the toy is playing with the kid and not viceversa, and it has many more options than the childs imagination. This may be good or bad, we will see what toys the next generations of kids will have, to realize how toys evolved. About 13 years ago, together with some friends, I even set up an association whose main purpose was to set up a toy museum, and based on this association, we started to have activities across the country. We have organized over 100 exhibitions in the last 12 years in collaboration with the big museums of Romania and we have practically analyzed, all these years, the reaction of the public, of both kids and adults, which was a very good reaction. We have enriched our collections with toys collected from all corners of Romania and the project is still going on. We have started making a catalog of Romanian toys based on my own collections. Unfortunately, the catalogue is a bit delayed due to the pandemic. If in 2019 we had more than 20 exhibitions, this year we have done probably half, and we are still looking for our own location where to showcase the wonderful collection. Because the collection is very large, even if more than 3000 toys, objects and games related to Romanian childhood are exhibited here. The collection includes many more objects, which are now packed and which used to be displayed in travelling exhibitions. We have an exhibition devoted to the old school, which includes thousands of objects, school supplies, we have even school benches and uniforms. Another exhibition deals with boxes and sweets, candy boxes from Romania — I’m taking about over 500 objects, boxes of candies from Romania made between 1900-1980. It is a collection of childrens picture books, comics books. The toy collection was enriched every year with a collection of images of the Romanian childhood. They are representative images of the Romanian childhood from 1900, 1920, up until the 1980s.” (tr. L. Simion)

  • Lucian Pintilie’s “The Oak,” the first Romanian film digitally restored in

    Lucian Pintilie’s “The Oak,” the first Romanian film digitally restored in

    “The Oak (1992), directed by Lucian Pintilie, one of the best films in the history of Romanian cinema, is also the first Romanian production converted to 4K, which allows for high-quality screening, by BRD – Groupe Société Générale and Fundația9. The new work was first screened at Lumière 2019 Grand Lyon Film Festival, a festival set up as a tribute to the Lumière brothers, and early this year, in February, it was also released in Romania.



    The digitization was completed at the Hiventy laboratory in France, and the restoration took place in Romania, at the Avanpost Media studio, with the support and counselling of Florin Mihăilescu, director of photography and close friend of director Lucian Pintilie.



    The restoration process took over 6 months, and was designed to improve the image and sound and to convert the film to 4K.



    Premiered at the 1992 Cannes Festival and based on the novel of the same name written by Ion Băieșu, “The Oak is Pintilies first film after his return from exile, and tells the story of a young teacher and a surgeon struggling with the last days of the communist regime. The cast includes Maia Morgenstern, Răzvan Vasilescu, Victor Rebengiuc, Marcel Iureș. “The Oak was a springboard for Maia Morgensterns international career, as it won her the European Film Academys award for best actress.



    The restoration of “The Oak is part of a broader programme run by Fundația 9, the “Lucian Pintilie Cinema Fund, created in the memory of the great Romanian film director at the initiative of Corina Șuteu, a member of the Foundations Board.



    With this Fund, Fundația9 seeks to pay tribute to the great Romanian filmmaker and to support art films by young Romanian directors. We talked to Anca Drăgoi, executive director of Fundația 9, and Sebastian Plămădeală, one of the senior technicians at Avanpost studio, about the first restoration in Romanian cinema.



    Anca Drăgoi: “The goal of the “Lucian Pintilie Cinema Fund was to support a young generation of film directors. We are also aware of the importance of recovering Lucian Pintilies work, especially since this is not necessarily regular practice in Romania. What we want, in fact, is to create a best practice in this respect. This first restoration and digitization project should ideally create a positive trend in recovering Romanias audio-visual heritage. We are aware that Romanian cinema needs a lot of support if it is to carry on, and I would be very happy to see that the restoration of “The Oak is a first example that encourages not only public, but also private stakeholders. Our first discussions were with the French co-producer and also distributor of the film, MK2, which was extremely efficient. There were several competitive offers at the time, but we realised that it would be of high symbolic value to prove that top quality things can be done in Romania as well. So we compared the offers, some of them coming from prestigious European labs, and decided to do the restoration in Romania, at Avanpost studio. I believe this benefitted everyone, including ourselves, in that it strengthened our self-confidence.



    Sebastian Plămădeală, one of the senior technicians with Avanpost studio, told us about the restoration process:



    Sebastian Plămădeală: “We were glad to be trusted by Fundația 9 with this challenging project. Fortunately, we started the restoration process with the film already digitized in this 4K format, the French co-producer MK2 scanned the negative film stock and also converted the sound from magnetic tape to digital format. This allowed us to focus on the actual restoration, instead of spending time to convert from the analogue to digital. The restoration involved 3 parallel levels: colouring, restoring the sound and restoring the image, which means eliminating debris or scratches mar from the original negative. A major challenge at each restoration of this kind is that you usually have to make decisions by yourself, without the film author. With “The Oak, we were lucky to have the support of Mr. Florin Mihăilescu, who worked closely with director Lucian Pintilie and is familiar with his choices. So we stayed true to the original.



    The restoration process involved 3 sound professionals from Avanpost Studio (Florin Tăbăcaru for sound mixing and editing, Dragoș Știrbu for dialogue editing and sound editing assistant Victor Miu) and 5 photography professionals (Workflow Supervisor Sebastian Plămădeală, technicians Alex Stoica, Irina Tomașu, and Andreea Nedelcu, and Claudiu Doagă for colouring). They were all coordinated by Carmen Rizac, in a project that took over 6 months to complete. The international distributor is MK2, the French co-producer of the film. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • BIEFF: The Bucharest International Experimental Film Festival

    BIEFF: The Bucharest International Experimental Film Festival

    The 10th edition of the BIEFF, The Bucharest International Experimental Film Festival, the first to be held in a hybrid fashion, online and offline, concluded on Sunday, November 29th. Through the BIEFF streaming platform, viewers around the country could follow the 6 days of the festival with the most audacious film experiments of the year, while movie lovers in Bucharest had the opportunity to explore a wide selection of short film in partner art galleries.




    We talked to Oana Ghera, the new artistic director of the festival, about how this event could be held at the height of the pandemic:


    “This is a special year, and we worked a lot on the selection in the middle of the lockdown, and we discovered there a plethora of topics that seemed to concern both us, the curators, and the directors of the movies. We realized that this idea of utopia, or dystopia, of a brave new world that we found during isolation, was anticipated by the directors. We are talking about a search for alternative futures, new ways to imagine society, starting from the problems we currently face. We do curator work, we have no influence on who signs up for the festival, we search far and wide for the movies we show at the festival. We usually choose movies from distribution catalogs, that are path breakers in terms of experimental films. In this way, we bring in the most interesting productions to the Romanian audience. We dont start off from set criteria, with a set topic, we try to sound the current topics, the most interesting, that tie together as many directors as we can.”




    Oana Ghera, the new artistic director of the festival, told us about the themes of the movies in the festival:


    “This year we had seven curatorial themes, seven programs that made up the international competition with 39 titles. The broad umbrella was A Brave New World, which included two programs, utopia and dystopia. They are called Embracing Utopia and The Spectre of Dystopia. We proposed themes that we believe are very important for the present moment. One of these themes is women and their roles in a series of 6 short films directed by women. The Map Is Not a Territory is a program that discusses migration in the contemporary world, a topic that keeps being on the BIEFF agenda over the last few years, because directors take a real interest in this topic that has been central to this decade. An Act of Violence is another major theme at the festival this year. It treats depictions of violence, from war to terror attacks to the small acts of violence that occur more and more around us. In this edition we included Sublime Bodies, which talks about the representation and politics of bodies, about the place bodies have in the public space. We also have A State of Grace, which, just like the Embrace Your Utopia section, looks at the way in which we can seek refuge in a troubled world, like the one we live in. We like to say that BIEFF is a space for the reflection and debate, not just a space to watch new movie productions. This year we hope, more than ever, that the movies that we chose will invite people to reflect on our times, and maybe in this way, starting from new ways of seeing the future and new ways of discussing what is happening to us, we may find a way to slowly re-invent ourselves as a society. This is the reason for which we have paired the short films with an equal number of debates, in which we discuss with the directors of these movies, as well as special guests, talking about the topics tackled by these competition themes.”




    They parlaient idéale, a film about dreaming of alternative ways of existence, won the Grand Prize of the BIEFF 2020. It was directed by Laure Prouvost, and prevailed among the 39 short films in the international competition, with its audaciousness, political sensitivity, and joy in these dark times. It was a joint French-Belgian-Italian production, skipping formal and iconographic borders, beyond the limitations of age, nation, race, or species. The film is inspired by surrealism, street magic, eccentric fantasy, and more. This was the appreciation of the jury, this time made up of Charlotte Serrand, artistic consultant for the Cannes film festival, Irina Trocan, a lecturer with the film school in Bucharest, and Maha Maamoon, a member of the Forum Expanded team of the Berlinale.