Simona Runcan at STANDARD (OSLO)

Artist: Simona Runcan

Exhibition title: Silent Cohabitations

Venue: STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo, Norway

Date: November 18 – December 18, 2021

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and STANDARD (OSLO)

“We turn not older with years, but newer every day.”
– Emily Dickinson, “Letter to Louise Norcross”, 1872

“No anecdote, no event, nothing sensational, not even the smallest human presence, just the fascination of the trace left by it.”
– Simona Runcan

Simona Runcan’s paintings still seem to come into being, even though they were started more than 30 years ago. They are still taking shape: the cones, the cylinders, and the other fgures that keep on reappearing in her paintings, all seem to be changing as one is looking at them. Ever so slightly leaning or ever so slowly falling apart. Runcan would make these fgures using various pieces of fabric – twisting them, turning them, and tying them up. Or by simply letting the fabric wrap around an object that she had made – hiding it and letting the outlines of it get blurred. She would arrange these fgures on a horizontal line and photograph them prior to painting them. The painting ending up ofering a matter-of-fact observation of what are not facts, but something that is concealed rather than revealed. The painting becoming as much about what can not be seen or the tension of the fabric that could come undone. The painting still holding onto the energy of instability that these fgures initially were in possession of. They are neither frmly fxed to the ground nor entirely fnding its place within the pictorial space. Their folds, their fne lines, and their shifting hues that provide them with plasticity, are set against a solid background that so willingly is collapsing any notion of depth or nuance. Then, as she was approaching the year of 1989 and became a witness to the Romanian revolution, these shapes would be returning but also shifting. Through the fabric one senses not so much the outline of a body, as one senses the movements of a body in pain. The way that the fabric now is twisted, turned and tied up, making for a diferent sort of distortion. Wreaths that are commemorating the dead are resting on the ground, while around them everything is coming to life.

Simona Runcan (1942-2007), lived and worked in Bucharest, Romania, and Paris, France. She received her education from the Nicolae Grigorescu Fine Arts Institute in Bucharest, where she graduated from the Graphics Department in 1966. She returned to the same school in 1989, then renamed as National University of Arts, as a teacher at the Fashion Design and Art Pedagogy Departments. Throughout her practice as an artist, she was taking part in exhibitions in Romania and abroad, including Simeza Gallery, Bucharest, Romania; Charlottenborg Kunsthal, Copenhagen, Denmark; Groninger Museum, Groningen, Netherlands; as well as two exhibitions in Norway, at Galleri Norske Grafkere (1977) and the Norwegian International Print Biennale in Fredrikstad in Norway (1980). In 2016 the “Palatele Brâncovenești” Cultural Centre in Mogoșoaia, Romania, hosted the very frst retrospective exhibition dedicated to Simona Runcan’s works and published a monograph on the occasion. Since 2016, Ivan Gallery has been representing the estate, putting on two solo exhibitions as well as a number of fair presentations. This exhibition is made possible by the support of Ivan Gallery and Ioana Măgureanu.

Simona Runcan, Silent Cohabitations, 2021, Installation view, STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo 18.11.2021-18.12.2021, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1988, Oil on canvas / Framed, 90 x 90 x 2 cm / 35 1/2 x 35 1/2 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1988, Oil on canvas / Framed, 82 x 82 x 2 cm / 32 1/4 x 32 1/4 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1999, Oil on canvas / Framed, 38 x 38 x 2 cm / 15 x 15 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1988, Oil on canvas / Framed, 93 x 93 x 2 cm / 36 2/3 x 36 2/3 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1999, Oil on canvas / Framed, 83 x 83 x 2 cm / 32 2/3 x 32 2/3 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase II / Silent Cohabitations II 1988 – 1999, Oil on canvas / Framed, 67 x 132 x 2 cm / 26 1/3 x 52 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1988 – 1999, Oil on canvas / Framed, 67 x 67 x 2 cm / 26 1/3 x 26 1/3 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1988 – 1999, Oil on canvas / Framed, 85 x 85 x 2 cm / 33 1/2 x 33 1/2 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1988 – 1999, Oil on canvas / Framed, 73 x 81 x 2 cm / 28 3/4 x 32 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven

Simona Runcan, Convietuiri silentioase / Silent Cohabitations, 1988 – 1999, Oil on canvas / Framed, 75 x 82 x 2 cm / 29 1/2 x 32 1/4 x 3/4 in, Courtesy of The Estate of Simona Runcan, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest and STANDARD (OSLO), Oslo. Photographer: Vegard Kleven