Horror Vacui, the longest theatrical event in the world, is set to take place at the Galateca Art Gallery in Bucharest, from February 15 to 22, being organised by the A.R.T. Fusion Association, under the Papercuts platform umbrella, to bring into discussion abandonment, "a profound rift in Romania's history", as more than one million children were abandoned during the communist period, informs a press release sent to AGERPRES on Monday.
Horror Vacui is a large-scale artistic act, a durational theatre performance supported by over 500 actors 24 hours a day and will be a world premiere.
The event aims to mediate emotionally and to call for the recognition of a part of Romania's traumatic past, to shed light on the issue of child abandonment in our country and the history of this phenomenon during the communist period, the press release shows.
Maia Morgenstern, Ofelia Popii, Ada Gales, Mihaela Sirbu, Richard Bovnovski, Nicoleta Lefter, Tudor Cucu Dumitrescu, as well as Kate Pendry, a British-Norwegian actress and winner of the Ibsen Prize, are some of the actors that will be participating in the event, alongside internationally renowned writers and journalists.
"These are complicated times, when isolation and abandonment persist in various forms around us. We think of Papercuts as a platform for civic fitness, a space of mediation between the past and the future. With Horror Vacui, we seek to write, alongside spectators, an open letter to the Romanian state, so that it publicly recognizes the horrors committed between 1966 and 1990 and it makes this recognition a promise for the future. More than a million children abandoned then are now part of society, but face difficulties integrating. Horror Vacui is an attempt of art to strengthen its political and empathic potential," Alexandru Ivanoiu, actor, playwright and initiator of the project, was quoted as saying in the press release.
The public is invited to contribute testimonials or personal stories of abandonment, which can be included in the performance and interpreted by the actors, by visiting https://bit.ly/formular-papercuts. Volunteers can also sign up on the same form to support the event on site, specifies the source.
"This cultural approach tries to bring into question a profound rift in Romania's history. Over a million children were abandoned during the communist period, becoming victims of a system that turned them into 'nobody's children'. Until today, the Romanian state has no concrete data about this tragic reality and continues to ignore its responsibility towards this vulnerable part of society. Papercuts and Horror Vacui push the boundaries of culture and social engagement and come to provoke a recognition of the past, creating premises for a more responsible future," the press release states.
Horror Vacui - "the emptiness phobia" - deals with abandonment, emptiness and collective responsibility.
The performance will take place for seven days non-stop, with an impressive artistic effort: 505 actors, three per hour, 505 texts about emptiness and the antonym of abandonment. These texts, half of which are based on testimonies and stories archived by the Museum of Abandonment, outline a collective meditation on acknowledging the past and rebuilding the future.
The initiative aims to create an intimate and continuous space of dialogue towards finding solutions. This space will act as a bridge between the past and the future, keeping presence and reflection alive throughout the week. An essential element of the project is that, no matter the moment, in this place in Bucharest there will always be someone available to talk about these topics, whether the public comes to listen or not, the organisers explain.
Participation is free and the detailed program will be announced soon on the project's social networks.
The Museum of Abandonment is a partner in this project, providing an archival and emotional setting to explore the theme.
"The Museum of Abandonment aims to bring to light this huge collective trauma in Romania - abandonment. The more we ignore this wound, the deeper it will dig into the social fabric, necrotizing more and more layers of the collective emotional. Horror Vacui and the Papercuts project hope to be a trigger for action and responsibility. If we want a more inclusive, more empathetic, more responsible society, we each have something to do in this sense," emphasized Oana Dragulinescu, founder of the Museum of Abandonment.
Papercuts is a bilateral initiative funded under the RO-CULTURA Programme, through the National Bilateral Fund of the EEA and Norway Grants.