Ion Bârlădeanu la Euronews

Romanian tramp lauded by the art world

Only two years ago the works of Romanian artist Ion Barladeanu were light-years away from the world of art-galleries.

Then, the 63 year old was living rough among the bins of a Bucharest tower-block.

But after a chance discovery, he is now an international star ( .. )

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Art as we know it is finished

... se plânge comentatorul şi criticul Jonathan Jones.

The economic collapse has destroyed the money art of the last two decades. In its place, we need something new.

The economic collapse is hitting the art world in some surreal ways. Gagosian Gallery in Los Angeles has just had to postpone a planned exhibition, by the maverick performance and conceptual artist Chris Burden, that involves the use of 100kg of gold bricks. Gagosian purchased these – wow! How much does 100kg of gold bricks even cost? - from a company called Stanford Coins and Bullion. This company is a subsidiary of Stanford Financial Group, that is, it's part of the empire of Texas financier Allen Stanford who is now at the centre of a massive fraud investigation. Now, announces Gagosian, "the gallery's gold has been frozen while the SEC investigates Stanford."

So the stories are spinning as the marriage of art and money unravels.

Continuarea în the Guardian

despre arhitectura tiganeasca din Romania in cafebabel.com

In Buzescu, Roma architecture is surreal real estate

If you travel across Alexandria in the direction of Buzescu, you'll see rural houses with little vegetable gardens nestling on the left and right of the main street. It's quite a normal Romanian village. Suddenly behind the church, glistening high roofs with metal and tin towers dazzle in the bright sunshine. Mercedes stars on the ridge of the roof, pagoda after pagoda, silver flaking roofs: a mixture of styles carried to extremes.

The orgins of the so-called Roma palaces in the style of pagodas lie in this small Romanian village. The artist-architect trio Mariana Celac, Iosif Király and Marius Marcu-Lapadat are the first non-Roma to have explained the phenomenon with their photo feature Tinseltown in 2001. According to Celac, a skilled town planner and critic of Ceausescu's regime, a variety of qualities which have been lost in contemporary architecture can be found here ( .. )

de Natalie Lazar in cafebabel.com
Image: ©Natalie Lazar