Anca Stefanescu
Romanian, b. 1974
Short biography:
Born in Bucharest in 1974 during the communist regime she was sent away at the age of five months and raised by her paternal
grandparents into an isolated rural environment for seven years. This led her to draw from an early age having her grandfather support
her passion. At the age of twelve, she was admitted to study art at the only art school in Bucharest. In 1999 she graduated from the
Academy of Arts, Bucharest with a degree in painting and conceptual art. Trained as a painter Stefanescu interrupted painting in 1997,
in a public performance, and for more than a decade, she turned her attention to performances, film, photo installations, assemblies,
site-specific environmental interventions and writing. She recurrently adopted new mediums, later observing that ‘change is the key to
survival and expansion, not a style or a certain medium'. What has always been important for Anca is the birth of the idea; its
forceful aggression one may symbolically inflict upon oneself in order to remain faithful to inner intentions and impetuses finding
ways to direct into a material action what the psyche projected into visions. Early in her career and before her graduation, she was
outspoken about her use of writing in performances. Composed over the course of 2 years in 2000 she finished the book ‘Who Am I?’, a
meditation on memory and mind examining the anxiety and depression of the author’s childhood, adopting elements of memoir, essay and
poetry. The distinctive intimacy of her writing brought her to Maria Hlavajova's attention who selected her for Manifesta 3 titled
Borderline Syndrome: Energies of Defence. While still a student she took part in group events as a militant in the attempts of changing
the academic curriculum into a contemporary one as well as a performer, voice of the young women’s generation raised under a communist
dictatorship. The essence of her early art process came out of the ideological notions about a woman’s entanglements with
education, men, money, children; their private despair leading to drinking, madness, or suicide; but also the healing process that can
bring spiritual enlightenment.
Following graduation, she worked and experimented with computer animation and visual effects. She discovered the world of CG graphics
in the noughties, soon expanding her studio practice. Anca Stefanescu collaborated as a DI Colourist and Art Director in vanguard
commercials and with Post Production Houses for short films, films and music videos.
Concerned with the common belief developed in Romania under the most brutal Communist regime in Eastern Europe that described art as
elitist, enigmatic and “indigestible” in 2013 she created the project Love Art–Wear Art, being the co-founder of two art-fashion
brands. Her main focus was on the idea of making limited-edition or unique wearable art items blurring boundaries between art and
fashion, transforming her paintings into wearable art objects, hand-made pieces of bags and accessories for women.
In the last decade, her painting process became a metaphysical inquiry into the very nature of reality, conveying ideas about parallel
worlds and spiritual dimensions, using paintbrush strokes, marks, signs or any of the symbols of an alphabet as ‘high-frequency
vibrations translated into colours’. Her inspiration is a synthesis of world religions, theosophy and spiritualism, sciences and colour
theory. Emphasizing on the mystical experience she holds that there is a deeper spiritual reality and this direct contact with this
reality can be established through intuition, revelation, meditation or some other state transcending habitual human perception.
Instead of painting external realities, the artists depict inner spiritual experiences. Her working process reflects the divisions of
consciousness expressed as intersections of corporeal reality, dream state, transcendental meditation, memory construction, noise and
silence, known and unknown. ‘When I create I am like in a dream state and I ideate not just objects to be looked at, but an extension
of my inner state, and out of the body experience that will give the viewer glimpses from another dimension. Paintings are solidified
feelings on canvas and when the observer is looking at them the feeling is again motion, moving out from the painting into the
beholder’s perception. I believe in this perfect continuum and all I care for are the emotions that I express through my intuition. Our
thoughts and emotions are vibrations and just like the colours they are the universal language that everyone instinctively
understands.’ Stefanescu’s work is about the potential of the subconscious mind perceived as the contrast between expansive and
contractive, masculine and feminine, restraint and flow, perception and illusion, channelling her dreams, visions and revelations into
the painted works. Situated in the field of metaphysical studies, her work portrays the liminal space between the physical world and
the mind aiming to awaken the viewer into a state of enlightenment through the metaphysical properties of colour and form.
‘I think change is the key to survival and expansion. It may be painfully perceived many times but it forces ideas to grow into
temporal realization. It is energy directed into material action. I see change as a challenge and I make it the very substance of my
art. Every new series has to match the imaginative process not a certain means of expression already developed. Ideas, intentions,
feelings must subdue the style. I just need to push my imagination through my body. My work has to passionately interest me.'
Education
2010-2011 Soho Editors Talent & Training, London (visual effects, finishing and colour grading software)
1994-1999 National University of Arts-UNArte, Bucharest, Romania
1989-1993 Art High School-N. Tonitza, Bucharest, Romania
1986-1989 Art School-N. Tonitza, Bucharest, Romania
Solo Exhibitions
2021 The Innocent Perception, Eclectic Gallery, London, United Kingdom (download the exhibition catalogue)
2020 The Need of Belonging, Romanian Cultural Institute, London, United Kingdom
2019 Breathing Space, Open Studio Exhibition, London
2016 Bitter or Sweeter, Molecule-F, Bucharest, Romania
2015 Love Art - Wear Art, Molecule-F, Bucharest, Romania
2014 Art & Fashion, Entrance, Bucharest, Romania
1999 Who Am I?, Art Academy, Bucharest, Romania
Biennials
2018 Biennial Larnaca, Cyprus, Multiple Locations
2017 RomArt Biennial, The International Biennial of Art and Culture in Rome, Italy
2017 Florence Biennale, Florence, Italy
2000 Manifesta 3, (selected), Contemporary Art Biennial, Ljubljana, Slovenia
1999 Periferic, Iasi, Romania
1998 IntermediArt – Contemporary Art Biennial, Oradea, Romania
Exhibitions
2021 Abstraction and Perception, Eclectic Gallery, London, United Kingdom
2021 Colourful Bits, Eclectic Gallery, London, United Kingdom
2020 Resilience, Pop Up Exhibition, Curaty Gallery, Mayfair, London, United Kingdom
2020 Wiltshire Creative Summer Open Exhibition, Salisbury Arts Centre, Salisbury, United Kingdom
2019 The Other Art Fair London, Art Fair by Saatchi Art, London, United Kingdom
2018 Sunny Art Prize Exhibition, London, United Kingdom
2018 NAG Art Gallery, Contemporary Exhibition, San Lorenzo Church, Florence, Italy
2018 World Art Dubai, Contemporary Art Fair, Dubai World Trade Centre, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
2018 Jorge Jurado Gallery, Bogota, Columbia
2018 ART Innsbruck, International Art Fair, Innsbruck, Austria
2017 Contemporary Art Space, The Room Gallery, Venice, Italy
2017 Spectrum/Red Dot Miami, Contemporary Art Show, Miami, FL, USA
2017 RomArt Biennial, The International Biennial of Art and Culture in Rome, Italy
2017 Alchemic Body | Fire. Air. Water. Earth, Jorge Jurado Gallery, Art Festival, Bogota, Columbia
2017 Anima Mundi Visions, Palazzo Ca’ Zanardi Gallery, It’Liquid International Art Festival, Venice, Italy
2017 Patterns, Light Space & Time Art Gallery, Jupiter, FL, USA
2017 Geometry, Online Exhibition, AntoNova Gallery, Jacksonville, FL, USA
2017 Blue Art Show, Colors of Humanity, Art Gallery, Everett, PA, USA
2017 Femininity Art Online Exhibition, International Gallery Of The Arts, Toronto, ON, Canada
2016 Bitter or Sweeter, Installation - Molecule-F Concept Store, Bucharest, Romania
2015 Love Art - Wear Art, Installation - Molecule-F Concept Store, Bucharest, Romania
2014 Art & Fashion, Entrance Concept Store, Bucharest, Romania
2014 Romanian Design Week, "Timeless Collection", Bucharest, Romania
2012 Physical Education, 109, "The Place", Bucharest, Romania
2013 Book Cover Tee, Chapter 3, Bucharest, Romania
2010 Opening, Gandy Gallery, Bratislava, Slovakia
2005 Fix Alert, Green Hours, Bucharest, Romania
2004 20 Minutes of Glory, Video Installation, MNAC Centre, Bucharest, Romania
2002 Other P’Art, M.A.M.Ü. Galley, Budapest, Hungary
2000 Other P’Art, French Institute, Polish Institute, M.A.M.Ü. Galley, Budapest, Hungary
2000 20 Minutes of Glory, Video Installation, Mission Art Gallery, Budapest, Hungary
2000 498, Eforie Gallery, Bucharest, Romania
2000 Other P’Art International, Art Camp, Tihany, Hungary
1999 AnnART 10, Performance Festival, St. Ann Lake, Romania
1999 Urban Feelings – Urban Facts, Rotor, Graz-Maribor, Austria-Slovenia
1999 Introduction to the New World, OSUT, Timisoara, Romania
1999 Manifesta 3 Ljubljana, Slovenia 1998
1999 IntermediArt – Contemporary Art Biennial, Oradea, Romania
1989 Normal, OSUT, Timisoara, Romania
Publications
2021 Colecta - The Art Magazine, (9 April/June issue), Italy
2020 Le Monde Diplomatique, (September issue), Paris, France
2018 Aesthetica, (Apr/May issue 81), London, UK
2018 Arte Contemporanea, published by NAG Gallery, Florence, Italy
2018 Aesthetica, (Feb/Mar 2018 issue), London, UK
2018 Aesthetica Dec/Jan 2018 issue, London, UK
2017 Exhibition catalogue, published by Anima Mundi, Venice
2017 Glamour, (vol. 6, June), London, UK
2017 Art & Beyond Chicago, USA
2017 Glamour, (vol. 6, June), London, UK
2017 Exhibition catalogue, The Room Gallery, Venice
2016 Unica, published by Unica, Bucharest, Romania
2015 Beaumonde, (vol. 12, December), Bucharest, Romania
2011 Villa Design, (vol. 5, June-November ), Bucharest, Romania
2010 Opening, published by Gandy Gallery, Bratislava, Slovakia
2002 Observatorul Cultural, written by Irina Cios, Bucharest, Romania
2000 Exhibition catalogue, published Other P’Art, M.A.M.Ü. Galley, Budapest, Hungary
Anca Stefanescu A Steam of Life, 2018 - 2022 Catalogue
Social media
https://www.instagram.com/anca.f.stefanescu
https://www.facebook.com/ancafrancescastefanescu