Raluca - Interviewed by Mat

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For the upcoming exhibition, Raluca Croitoru (b.1989) will be activating the gallery’s space through a series of performances involving other people’s routine. Croitoru has met with community members for the past weeks, trying to find the bond between other people’s lives and her artistic practice.

MD: If we could start by giving the reader a small insight into your background as an artist and how you’ve got to where you are today?

RC: I started by studying Economics in Bucharest and Nantes. When I was in France a shift happened and I realized I actually want to engage with art. So I finished my BA in Bucharest studying photography and video making and then I moved to the Netherlands, where I am currently living. I predominately work with performance and interaction in public space, using my body as a means not only for measuring and mapping but also for activating a space and the passers-by.

MD: I thought we could follow on from this with a brief introduction to what the audience will actually see within this new exhibition?

RC: The project is a re-enactment of a performance I did a year ago. It involved a visual and vocal representation of my daily routine. Because of my interest in daily habits, I decided to expand this project and get further involved with the community. I have been conducting interviews for the past weeks for this purpose with community members. My work will involve performing several times the different routines of the people I have met here by combining measurements of the objects they use daily with my personal approach to them.

MD: You mentioned that you did this a year ago, where was this? And then maybe we can talk a little bit more about your expectations of it for this new exhibition?

RC: The performance took place in Bucharest – I was at this point when I was struggling with my daily routine: going to work, going to my boyfriend’s place, staying in my house and I felt really full of these habits I was doing every day. I was invited to do a performance as an opening to an exhibition about stranded travellers – this was when I came up with the idea. Now I have decided to move from this individual representation to a collective one, in which I am try to understand and relate to other people’s struggles.

MD: You mentioned about members of the community that you are going to be working with – who are these people?

RC: I don’t particularly want to give too much information about them for the moment because I feel it will be more interesting to actually experience the performance in the space and let that reveal the individuals involved. All I can say is that they are people who have been doing the same work for a long amount of time.

MD: So people like in a traditional 9 - 5 working environment?

RC: More or less. They are people from all walks of life that experience a type of routine everyday: office workers, artists doing part-time jobs, cleaning people etc.

MD: And you said that you interviewed them?

RC: Yes. Maybe interview is not the proper word. We have been discussing about our lives and struggles.

MD: And how have those discussions evolved and how did they originally come about?

RC: It was through the Institute initially. Because I have never been here before, I asked them to put me in contact with these people. They have been very nice and people have been also very generous. We met for a coffee in the gallery café or went for a walk. The whole process is basically a way of understanding people, but also representing a certain part of their life into an artistic manner.

MD: I am kind of interested in the way you are going to interact with the gallery space. Could you maybe elaborate on what we will actually encounter when we go into then space?

RC: Actually, it’s not such a fixed structure. Mainly I am going to work in the gallery space, but at the same time I might decide to move in between the spaces, such as the lecture hall or the cinema or even the main hallway. The performances will involve me vocalizing another person’s routine while spreading in the space various materials which I employed for measuring the objects they use on a daily basis. When the performance ends, these materials will be left in the space for the rest of the day, transforming and engaging in a different dialogue with the space and the public.

MD: That brings me to an important question. In terms of the actual performance of the measuring of objects and their vocalization - I presume that is going to be happening in the space?

RC: The objects will have been already measured when I will start the performance, whereas the vocalization will be simultaneous to spreading of the measurement materials in the space. The process is actually much longer than the live performance, because it involves discussions with people and visits to their workplaces and homes.

MD: Are you going to be in the space?

RC: Yes, I am going to perform this live.

MD: So you will be a constant presence in the gallery?

RC: The performances will be announced, so that people from the area know when each of them will take place. If they miss it, they will be able to see the remains of it spread through the gallery space until the end of the day, when they are going to be taken away for the next performance.

MD: This brings me onto the issue of documentation - Is it important to you?

RC: For this project not that much. My focus is on what happens live. I am going to have some photos taken and maybe use some excerpts from the text as documentation. However, this is not my main interest for the project. I kind of prefer it to become more ephemeral.

MD: Are you conscious of the audience’s reaction or is it more to do with your relationship with the people you are directly involving?

RC: That’s a very good question. I think it’s double-sided because I am actually trying to see the extent to which these habits are universal. And how they can relate to anybody, no matter from what part of the world that person is from. The way I see it, we are constantly asked to perform in a certain way...

MD: I see it almost as about the tension of maintaining these habits, consciously and unconsciously, whilst simultaneously wanting to break away from them….

RC: I think it’s a very complex discussion and maybe I am not the right person to talk about it. Maybe a sociologist would be better equipped? In a way it’s about breaking and living with these habits at the same time. I think this is what we are constantly doing anyway.

MD: I completely agree.