For almost four decades, Romanian artist Lia Perjovschi has been creating situations and developing strategies to confront a radically changing world. Having grown up under the regime of dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu, Perjovschi first developed her multilayered artistic practice under the influence of real existing socialism. Facing political censorship and material scarcities, the artist initially created intimate artistic experiments using her own body as a medium. After the 1989 Romanian revolution, she increasingly devoted her practice to methods of recording, structuring, and archiving information in a post-communist society shaped by the influx of global capitalism. Perjovschi describes her artistic evolution as a “journey from the physical body to the universal body of knowledge.”

Experiments and Conclusions is the first exhibition in Germany dedicated to Perjovschi’s early work, which combines concrete poetry, sculpture, and performance art. Often resulting from open-ended processes, the collected works reveal an understanding of art as a social study exploring interpersonal dynamics and psychological states. Fascinated by motifs of doppelgangers, alter egos, and shadows, Perjovschi humorously and critically stages the female body as a site of resistance and instrument against the inability to act in the face of political and social repression.

Lia Perjovschi (*1961 in Sibiu / Romania) studied fine arts at the State Academy of Arts in Bucharest from 1987 to 1993. Her artistic practice encompasses cross-media series as well as curatorial approaches, workshops, and lectures. Her work has been featured in over 700 exhibitions worldwide, including at Tallinn Art Hall (2021); Muzeum Susch, Zernez / Switzerland (2020); BOZAR, Brussels; Art Encounters Biennial, Timișoara / Romania (both 2019); Kunsthaus Hamburg (2016); Nasher Museum of Art, Durham / USA; São Paulo Biennale (both 2014); Sydney Biennale (2009); Generali Foundation, Vienna (2005). She is the founder and coordinator of the Contemporary Art Archive and Centre for Art Analysis (CAA / CAA, since 1985) and the interdisciplinary research project Knowledge Museum (KM, since 1999), which explores alternative forms of classifying and presenting information.

Diskursprogramm

Ab Donnerstag, 18. Juli 2024
A Loud Life in Silence
Ein Online-Gespräch mit Lia Perjovschi und Kristine Stiles (Professorin für Art, Art History and Visual Studies, Duke University, Durham / USA)
In englischer Sprache