If Silence Had a Shape
curator: Diana Molnos
MATCA Art Space, Cluj-Napoca
MATCA Art Space, Cluj-Napoca
What if?
A question that gnaws at the individual and becomes the red thread of the exhibition If Silence Had a Shape. A question that does not necessarily seek answers, but opens up a space for reflection on the Romanian rural landscape, marked by silent, rapid, and irreversible transformations. The village that once pulsed with life, traditions, and a sense of belonging is now dissolved into a fragmented landscape, marked by demographic decline, economic marginalization, and abandonment.
In this context, Andrea Medar seeks a symbolic return to her grandparents’ house in the village of Racoti. Her works are not mere representations of a personal place but become elements that highlight both individual memory and collective memory threatened by oblivion.
The house, the garden, the yard, once spaces of abundance, are today places where silence takes shape.
Wild vegetation creeps through windows and cracks, gradually covering the traces of habitation. Nature becomes the protagonist, reclaiming a place emptied of people and history.
Plants, leaves, and thorns are carefully crafted using traditional hand techniques that give form to the ephemeral. For the artist, stitching is a language and an act of cultural continuity, a bridge between what once was and what (still) might be. Her works raise fundamental questions: what do we keep and what do we leave behind, how do we remember, and how does silence take shape where once there was voice, gesture, presence? (Diana Molnos)
A question that gnaws at the individual and becomes the red thread of the exhibition If Silence Had a Shape. A question that does not necessarily seek answers, but opens up a space for reflection on the Romanian rural landscape, marked by silent, rapid, and irreversible transformations. The village that once pulsed with life, traditions, and a sense of belonging is now dissolved into a fragmented landscape, marked by demographic decline, economic marginalization, and abandonment.
In this context, Andrea Medar seeks a symbolic return to her grandparents’ house in the village of Racoti. Her works are not mere representations of a personal place but become elements that highlight both individual memory and collective memory threatened by oblivion.
The house, the garden, the yard, once spaces of abundance, are today places where silence takes shape.
Wild vegetation creeps through windows and cracks, gradually covering the traces of habitation. Nature becomes the protagonist, reclaiming a place emptied of people and history.
Plants, leaves, and thorns are carefully crafted using traditional hand techniques that give form to the ephemeral. For the artist, stitching is a language and an act of cultural continuity, a bridge between what once was and what (still) might be. Her works raise fundamental questions: what do we keep and what do we leave behind, how do we remember, and how does silence take shape where once there was voice, gesture, presence? (Diana Molnos)
