Echo of Pain
next to the Puisor post office… opposite the new Marriott hotel (and the associated limousines) a group of young artists named Ecou wrapped an apartment in newspaper. Walls, sofas, floors, tables, library, books in the library, knickknacks in front of the books. It’s the first time communist architecture seems to me to look good. From the inside. A simple intervention with maximum effect. “Information” covers everything, and the three-dimensional media delirium reminds us of both the ephemerality of printed ideas and of “covered” objects. Starting from the idea that only in the toilet do you have the peace to read the newspaper, the work of the Ecou group goes out into the hallway and living room, overlapping the daily life of private space with the daily life of public space. Text and hypertext….In the 80s, Soviet art in the apt (apartment) was motivated by the ideological censorship of the dictatorial system….what makes the people at Ecou “use” the apartment as a gallery again today?

At the end of March, an exhibition opened at the Galla Gallery that I do not hesitate to report from the first days of its existence. This is despite the fact that these are names that no one has heard of yet, for the simple reason that the exhibitors are third-year students in Teodor Moraru’s painting class, within the “Luceafarul” Art Academy. The critic gives in to impulse and wants to share with you the pleasant surprise he had in front of some works that he urges you to see in turn. I hope it will be a winning bet through confirmation in time from those on whom the present lines focus.
In fact, the appearance of these young people on the ramp brings additional arguments for situations that are increasingly clearly emerging on the current Romanian artistic (advanced) scene. 1. The “group phenomenon” is expanding. It seems that a new need for communication is intensifying in order to further mitigate the asperities and risks of alienation through prolonged individualism. Perhaps, especially, young people prefer to clarify some questions together, to formulate together, in order to give them weight, some goals, strategies. Perhaps, at least the beginnings are easier to bear economically in the group formula. 2. Our art of urban essence, re-presenting the temptation of an ever “new realism” (I am referring to young people), is inspired – the cases are multiplying – in recent times, with progressive insistence, from “street culture”, “neighborhood”. Musical stimuli, from the world of discos, from the textual and rhythmic repertoire of new bands, the example of graffiti art, data of everyday behavior, determine changes at the level of the pictorial image especially, marked by a reinvigorated neo-expressionism..
The authors we refer to in this text are: Teofil Androne, Dragos Burlacu, Cristian Gaspar, Razvan Neagoe, Justinian Scarlatescu and Carmen Vornicelu. The idea of ​​forming a group was born last year. They worked systematically, intensely, stimulated by Professor Moraru without coercion. At this spring meeting with the public, they present themselves with an exhibition that is almost surprisingly coherent for their fragile, forming artistic experience. However, we are not dealing with a closed horizon, with mutual mimicry – we note a lively polyphony, the landmarks of personalities that are searching for each other, courageously emerging. The pleasure of painting is a common denominator noticeable from the first contact with the works. Various techniques, the attack on different materials, the thirst for reality is exhibited in parallel with the concentrated analysis and potentiation of the plastic sign. The Ecou Group demonstrates through this exhibition its reason for being, also underlined by the displayed presence of a text-manifesto. Characters, objective situations, almost everything is “written” in an explosive neo-expressionist “key” (rarely counterpointed by “studies” with a freely assumed analytical air). Sometimes, translations of the tense figurative – simplified into abstraction – are also proposed. The exhibition route is directed from a regular exhibition, in the first halls, to the surprise of the last space, where, as in a dark room, the neon light filtered by a purple “garment” and the background music stimulate special effects, caused by the pigments with which the works in this hall were painted. The “echo” of the disco – the source of inspiration – creates a special atmosphere, personalized by strong “artificial” visual signals.
References can be made. To the graffiti art of Americana, Basquiat, Penck. Or even in our “yard”, to the Rostopasca group. Models circulate and are assimilated, consciously or not. It is one of the features of a living culture, in motion. We emphasize, however, at least equally, the authentic enthusiasm of the young group “Ecou”, the need of each of its members to express themselves, the audacity to take risks, the undisguised pleasure of working. The six are also aware of the condition of apprentices, the difficulties of the road ahead. The beginnings are consistently promising, which led me to say/write: “Watch out for Echo!”.