Romania's Pavilion at the International Art Exhibition, visited by 730,000 people

The Romania Pavilion at the International Art Exhibition - La Biennale di Venezia 2024, the 60th edition, was visited by 730,000 people. Prestigious publications such as The Guardian, Forbes, Apollo Magazine, Le Journal des Arts, The Art Newspaper, Whitewall and the Euronews television station included the Romanian project on the list of those that deserved to be visited. Romania was represented by the project "Ce este munca/What Work Is" by the artist Şerban Savu, curated by Ciprian Mureşan. The project was selected following the competition organized by the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Romanian Cultural Institute, being presented both in the National Pavilion in the Giardini della Biennale, and in the New Gallery of the Romanian Institute of Culture and Humanistic Research in Venice. The main theme of the 2024 Biennale, "Străini pretutindeni - Foreigners Everywhere", added an additional dimension to the works created by Şerban Savu, reflecting migration and the sense of uprootedness associated with working abroad.

An important aspect of the Romanian Cultural Institute's involvement in the Venice Biennale was the transformation of the New Gallery of the Romanian Institute of Culture and Humanistic Research in Venice into a mosaic workshop for the entire duration of the Biennale. Here, teams of mosaicists worked on a monumental piece based on a painting by Şerban Savu, combining Venetian tradition with contemporary conceptual questions. Following its presentation at the Venice Art Biennale, a large-scale mosaic work will be exhibited, in a first phase, at the National Museum of Art of Moldova in Chisinau, and subsequently, the work is to be permanently installed in a space in Chisinau, thus contributing to the cultural landscape of the city and to the cultural dialogue between Romania, the Republic of Moldova and the international public.

The Guardian stated that "in the Romanian pavilion, Şerban Savu's melancholic, fresco-like white paintings depict workers digging in ancient sites, bringing in the harvest or restoring church paintings. Returning from the fields, fishing in the rivers: this is life and leisure after (and perhaps before) communism: every scene captured made permanent in an eloquent way". Apollo Magazine included the exhibition in its list of "unmissable" pavilions, noting its sensitive approach to the relationship between work and leisure, with a melancholic note. At the same time, the Business Review publication highlighted the exhibition as a project that "promises to offer a profound exploration of the complex relationship between work, leisure and societal norms". The Financial Times highlighted the Romanian Pavilion for its originality and its relevant message in the current global context.

For the Romanian Cultural Institute, the Venice Art Biennale represents a catalyst for international cultural dialogue, contributing to the consolidation of bilateral relations between Romania and Italy, especially in the context of the Consolidated Strategic Partnership between the two countries, signed in 2024.