Răzvan Neagoe
Grain from Bucharest
”I live in a city that doesn’t belong to me, but that contains and squeezes me
always. Life takes place between the past and the present, never in the future. And it forces me to search for myself the truths that I can understand and transform into memories, fragments and sequences that haunt me to carry with me in my pocket. I never kept a journal because it wouldn’t have helped, but I wrote down in memory all the events that changed my city, your city, and their city.
My city, your city.”
Sponsor – Display Group
Răzvan Neagoe (b. 1974) is a Romanian visual artist, and member of the Romanian Plastic Union. The artistic genres in which he expresses himself are painting, photography, object, collage, performance, installations, landart, new media. It develops projects with a social aspect, architecture but also for the recovery of classical works. He was part of the Ecco group (founding member) in the early 2000s. Since 2006, he has been present with Alina Tudor – the focAR group in several large-scale projects, or more recently he is part of the artistic community STUP. He has participated in numerous exhibitions and artistic residencies. In 2007 he received the UAP youth award together with Alina Tudor for the ASEZareaTRECereaCERCul project. He currently lives and works in Bucharest.
Past times or present times, this is how Răzvan’s projects can be characterized in a few words. Always between two worlds: communism-capitalism, atheism-religion, east-west, urban-rural, he shows us the importance of history in his status as a citizen and an individual who lived almost 2 decades in the communist dictatorship, as then after a forced transition in the 90s to know democracy at home in the 2000s.
Being a cultural “TOURIST” and a “WITNESS” of the events mentioned above, Razvan Neagoe explores the dynamics of past and present society. He particularly focuses on projects that include space, considering the importance and influence of the outer space of objects. He is also interested in the urban transition from communism to capitalism and civic competence for a healthy society, which is why he has been involved in public and community art projects. He believes in the regeneration of urban and rural space through art. On this social and political basis, his projects talk about contemporaneity and history, EU influences on Eastern European countries, freedom of expression and, last but not least, identity through globalization.
Each artistic gesture, experimental photography, painting, installation or film are remnants of a well-determined and structured action around the identity of the individual pursued by consumerism and society, bringing to the fore the principles that maintain this society.
Among the most important projects we mention About Houses, life and others… (with Alina Tudor) where the two artists experienced for a month the daily life with the minimum wage in the economy (2012) http://www.artvictoria .ro/artist/razvan-neagoe; Je passé / J’habite /Je vis (with Alina Tudor) the theme starting from the concept “Lyon-tourist city, Lyon-civic city”, proposing an inside reflection of the outside space, as it exists for those who live or visit the city (2011) https://www.icr.ro/paris/city-switch-lyon-2011-focar-group-alina-tudor-si-razvan-neagoe; The 3 performances with titles that hide behind a history long gone The blue route…, Tomorrow is another day, You can’t live life from memories (2009). The MOnuMENTS (2010) project was presented at UNA Gallery as well as the personal manifestations Focus or Game’s rules in the mid-2000s. Between 2006-2009 he was involved in the public and community art projects I LOVE BUCHAREST. In the same period, together with Alina Tudor, he undertook several Urban actions such as the RED SPOT alarm signal (http://www.ilovebucharest.org/proiecte/red-spot-1) or stART Dambovita (http://dambovita.blogspot.com/).
