The cultural program of the National Art Museum in 2023 was successfully concluded with the exhibition NEOAVANGARDA TIMIȘOREANĂ – CONCEPT AND CONTEXTUALIZATION. This project is dedicated to an era of cultural flourishing, the reverberations of which are felt to this day. The museum’s curatorial team wishes to mark the remarkable contributions of a generation that, like front-line soldiers, explored the unknown, testing the predefined limits of art, thus rightly earning the title of Avant-garde.

The year 2023 is not the only year in which Timisoara has been in the spotlight, given the efforts of these artists, who have contributed to putting the city on the map. Our collective memory is greatly affected by the changes and turbulence of the last century, but it is imperative to remember that 50 years ago, several creators asserted themselves on the Timisoara cultural scene, shaping both the community and the generations that came after them by being involved in educating the young people who followed them.

This exhibition debunks the myth that the culture of the Warsaw Treaty member states in the 1960s and 1970s was purely retrograde. Political and cultural restrictions force art to mold itself to a specific vision and philosophy, but this premise contributes to the development of a counter-culture, which takes shape in the intimacy of workshops and classrooms, forming a culture parallel to the West, an experimental, calculated, lyrical art. Thanks to these artists, the Timisoara Neoavant-garde will not be born in a vacuum. It springs from fertile soil, marked by the last breaths of a Central European culture, connected to the great metropolises at the heart of the continent.

This exhibition brings together works created by Paul Neagu, Diet Sayler, Peter Jecza, Leon Vreme, Doru Tulcan, Viorel Toma, Lidia Ciolac, Szakáts Béla, Romul Nuțiu, Adalbert Luca, Sigma Group, Molnar Zoltan, Ștefan Bertalan, Ciprian Radovan, Roman Cotoșman, Constantin Flondor, Virginia Baz Baroiu, Eugenia Dumitrașcu and Xenia Eraclide Vreme, aiming to outline a unified image of this period. As the title of the exhibition says, these artists are linked by common notions, and the curatorial concept is organized in such a way as to contextualize each of them, through their belonging to different artistic movements.

Through this event, the museum has foreshadowed the activities of the year 2024, continuing to promote local heritage through actions, exhibitions, workshops, conferences and cultural mediation the rich artistic heritage of the city, continuing the tradition of excellence that we have shown in the year of the Cultural Capital.