Living and dead bodies. Performing Ceauşescu, 1978-2007

Addressing the particular historical and geopolitical context of central Eastern Europe over the late- and post-socialist period, a short film made by Romanian artist Ion Grigorescu in 1978 was remade nearly thirty years later under different circumstances. The examination of the two works — the first produced while Romania was under the Communist leadership of Nicolae Ceaușescu, the second after Communism — gives rise to numerous considerations that cross the technical and conceptual aspects of re-enactment with Romania’s recent history.

An important figure of the Romanian art scene of the 1970s and 80s, Ion Grigorescu (b. 1945) has, since his beginnings in the late 1960s, subtly reflected in his work some aspects of private and collective life under state socialism, as well as the social and urban changes that characterized Ceaușescu’s regime and its aftermaths. The museographic and curatorial narratives that have recently incorporated his work have mostly highlighted his body experiments on the one hand and, on the other, works pointing to the omnipresence of politics in daily life. This focus shadowed other remarkable aspects of Grigorescu’s multifaceted production rich in religious and literary references related to the development of spirituality and psychic life.