Group Exhibitions
"The Cluj Collective"
JD Malat Gallery, London, United Kingdom
2025
It has been eighteen years since the esteemed curator and art historian Jane Neal curated Cluj Connection, an exhibition credited for identifying Cluj as a bonafide art movement characterized by serious work ethic, a dark somber visual language and dry humor. Shortly after, the art world anointed a cohort of Romanian artists, such as the now familiar names Victor Man and Adrian Ghenie, whose works have been praised for their vigorous and prodigious take on haunting and historical subjects. One of the most exciting enigmas of recent years is how and why their art grandiosely took the art market, and a cohort of leading curators and collectors by storm? Growing up in the aftermath of the Romanian Revolution in 1989 and characterized by life in Post-Communist Romania, these artists – also referred to as the Cluj School – were celebrated for their evolving styles which resonated on an international scale without renouncing their own historical contexts. The artists presented in JD Malat Gallery’s latest group exhibition are similarly bound by the historical context of their generation. Aptly titled The Cluj Collective, this group of seven artists are indeed a collective born out of the historical Transylvanian capital of North-Western Romania, whose diverse painterly styles demonstrate the evolving thread of figurative painting inspired by the distinct culture of Cluj, and it’s beautiful to witness.