If it's Tuesday it's Expo Maraton, if it's Thursday it's Expo Maraton! This was happening for the whole month this May, and for the last 7 years, here in Cluj-Napoca at the University of Art and Design.
Expo Maraton is an event created both for our university and the large public of Cluj-Napoca, it is a practical exercise for the visibility of young artists. It's happening during May every year, two times a week on Tuesday and Thursday.
The project works mainly in favor of promoting the artistic debut of UAD students, supporting contemporary art by making it more accessible and easy to find and understand to the large public.
It consists of a competition in which UAD students apply with a concept, an exhibition idea/ project. Sixteen of them will be chosen and will exhibit for one day, two students each Tuesday and Thursday as you may have figured by now!
This year's participants
I absolutely loved the event! Very well put together, everything felt like it was going exactly as planned. It always started at 7:00 pm and not a minute later. The atmosphere was perfect, loads and loads of people were coming. Usually people from outside the university cannot come inside, but during Expo Maraton all kinds of people come to the event: tourist, artists, curators, gallery owners, teachers, friends and family of the students and others.
The garden of Casa Matei
Inside the gallery of Casa Matei it was very crowded, you could move around but it was rather stressful, knowing that the event only lasts about an hour. The time is more than enough, most of the time I wouldn't spent an hour in the gallery, i would say it's pretty easy to make an opinion, but seeing the works between the many people and walking around was quite an adventure. A lot of them were enjoying the wine and snacks and talking to each other instead of circulating and going outside.
Which takes me to the next big part! Everyone got the chance to vote three aspects of each exhibition, giving points from one to five for the following:
1. The aspect of the exhibition
2. The quality of the works of art
3. The concept
The urn, almost full of votes
This year they didn't provide pens or pencils, and even though for a whole month I went to the event two times a week I always forgot to bring a pen! Not a problem though, with so many people around. Voting itself I believe gives a strong feeling of importance and involvement, courage and trust in your own opinion, and the feeling that your voice is heard. The votes materialize in prizes, such a trips to different Biennales: Liverpool, Venice, Documenta, Istambul etc. The sponsors of Expo Maraton also give personalized prizes like: money, gifts, group shows and solo shows.
At last but not least, I want to mention the 1 Minute Challenge. Initiated only last year as part of the project Expo Maraton, students from the department of Photography-Video-Digital Image Processing are asked to join to make videos for the chosen artists, visual portofolios that were displayed on a T.V in the night of the exhibition and online one day before.
The event happens in a great and fast rhythm even for the viewer, but I'm sure that for the artists, coordinators, and volunteers it's even faster and a lot of work.
It's definitely an event to look forward to every year!
Images and information: https://www.facebook.com/ExpoMaraton/?ref=br_rs