ABOUT

Daniel Bălănescu's latest public appearance, the "Crossing. I am the System" exhibit* shows the minuteness, the perfectionism and the density of thought whereby, in an apparent scarcity of figurative motifs, using a symbol which he appropriates by retouching, he turns a large part of his work from the past several years into a meditation on the purposes of the individual in the modern world. It all starts from the drawing we are all familiar with, the man who crosses the street at the green light, sketched on all the traffic lights in the city, whose presence means that the crossing is possible, a figure which, slightly retouched, he begins to use in his works, thus being born the "Running Man". The running man is the key element that crosses the works. A character that has haunted the artist's works over the years, like an extra on the set of a movie, constant and persistent like a beggar. Slightly more insignificant at first, easily ignored and then, in time, imposing himself and compelling the artist to grant him the leading role. This evolution can be seen in the older works, such as "The Man with a Thousand Faces", a reinterpretation of the self-portrait – one of Daniel's favourite themes – and one can observe how, insinuatingly, the Running Man appears in several instances, figuratively, a mere sign, sometimes repeating itself in a multitude of signs, waiting to be discovered, hidden among other symbols, colours and impressions, to become, in his more recent works, the only sign. Crucial in the evolution of the "Running Man" theme as well as to defining the whole concept of ' Crossing' is the triptych completed in Linz in 2011, a series of three frustratingly austere works, each with an apparently simple background: red in one of the paintings, black in another and finally white, the colour backdrop against which the Running Man is multiplied in long juxtaposed rows, like the plastic sparrows on the wires of the counting frame. This is the moment when the Running Man ceases to be just another element among a conglomeration of elements that potentiate playfully by mere counterpoint a structure made of different tension axes. One can thus distinguish four areas of evolution. The first, one where the Running Man is placed, in a counterpointing manner, in a set of elements and is only used to potentiate the idea of the individual as series, as an element decorating the social environment. The second area is the one where, returning to the key motif of the tube card, in a piece which impresses by its dimensions, minuteness and diversity and is spectacular in that it is done on small items, he creates an art installation made up of approximately 2,000 tube cards, a single running man drawn on each of them. The cards are juxtaposed to create a living body, as impressive as a crowd gathered on a stadium and looked at from high above. The onlooker is not a demiurge who looks at the tiny figures; he is but a spectator of his own life who, having taken a few steps back, sees the social ensemble of the continuous movement of which he is a part as long as he belongs to a society he cannot detach himself from and which he willy-nilly represents. Himself appearing scared by the vivacity and noise created by the conglomeration of the tube cards in the 'Crossing' series which is done solely in shades of brown, ochre and greyish yellow, with discrete touches of colour, in the third area of approaching the theme the Running Man is rendered in a melancholy, thoughtful register acquiring weight, gravity, substance and even some saturnine accents in the fourth area of interpretation, the 'Running Man' series done solely in black and white, in various collage techniques, on various media such as unfinished wood, paper, cardboard and using various types of cements. Some of the pieces are even done in brittle grout so that a part of the 'running men' would suffer, slowly with the passing of time, various degrees of spoilage. The figure is decomposed and on the paper background there remains but the trace of the little figure, the way the memory of the departed one lingers in the minds of those who were close to him: sometimes more pregnantly, other times a mere outline of the vanished existence, any attempt to remember can but retrace a pale shadow. In 'Crossing. I am the System', Balanescu begins playing with the whole made up of a set, juxtaposing the singular and lonely one. One becomes all and all become one, the same way the individual remains a conscience in the set that is itself a conscience. As in a game with disjoint and inclusive sets, from the multitude of instances of the 'Running Man' there start lurking questions, thoughts, suppositions. 'Crossing. I am the System' is a serious project, centered around the disquieting themes that tackle the relationship between the individual and society, between the freedom of choice and power. This is in no way a political exhibit, as one would be inclined to believe when considering these themes. This is actually a meditation on the individual and on the freedom the individual has access to these days, in a world where distances and borders no longer seem insurmountable and where the individual gets lost in a multitude, and the multitude becomes all too often a mass. Are we so many that we lose our individuality? Is it so that we cannot succeed unless we form a critical mass, a revolted crowd? Or are we so many that revolt is impossible? Looked at from close-by I am an individual and from a distance an insignificant dot?"
Dan Plesa