‘Revisiting Romania: Dress and Identity’, exhibited at London’s Horniman Museum

Romanian art celebrating weekend follows on.

 Revisiting Romania: Dress and Identity exhibition, dedicated to the Romanian folk costume, is going on display at the London Horniman Museum -Balcony Gallery- on Friday, 4 October and will be open until 5 September, 2015. According to the well-known museum website, the exhibition explores how Romanian folk art has been used to express identity and nationhood in our country in the 19th and 20th centuries, including its use as a political tool during the Ceau?escu’s dictatorship.

Besides folk costumes, the display also gathers carpets and towels, textiles and household objects, all collected by the British curators in the last 100 years from the various ethnographic Romanian regions or donated by private persons over time. Many of the objects were donated in 1957 following an exhibition at the Horniman, which was organized from behind the Iron Curtain. Some others are originating from different London museum with similar collections. You shall discover an exquisite folk costume belonging to Romania’s Queen Mary among them.

The exhibition highlights the elaborately decorated textiles, costumes and artifacts used in Romanian peasant homes to showcase women’s skill and industry, to display a family’s social connections and to express national pride. It reflects the fascination and enchantment felt by visitors on seeing the textiles of Romania, explores the way in which the upper classes adopted peasant clothing, and looks at how the symbolsim attached to textiles – particularly costume – was manipulated under the Ceausescu regime to promote national unity.

Portraits from London exhibition will also go on display in London on Friday, a portraits’ gallery of 35 famous Romanians living in the UK. Both projects are due to the collaboration of Horniman Museum and the Romanian Cultural Institute (ICR).

You can find more details at http://www.photoion.co.uk/romanian-portraits-project-icr-horniman-museum/.

 

Vibrant weekend celebrating Romanian art, music, film and food

As a matter of fact, ICR London together with Horniman are scheduled to add to this authentic Romanian incursion a whole Revisiting Romania launch weekend summing up ethnographic film screenings, Romanian crafts demonstrations, open-air performances, poetry readings and storytelling, as well as gastronomic demonstrations and food stalls. The programme will include concerts by Ovidiu Lipan ??nd?ric? and brass band Fanfara 10 Pr?jini, jazz singer Irina Sârbu, a literary event with poets Ioana Ieronim and Fiona Sampson.

 

Find the complete list of Saturday and Sunday events on www.horniman.ac.uk/visit/events/revisiting-romania-launch-weekend

ceausescucratfsexhibitionfolk costumehorniman museumICRlondonrevisiting romaniaUK
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