József Bob (Bumbi), 1998, installation, environment, object art, bed back, wooden frames, press, sheet metal, textiles, dried plants, installation view, InSITU, Cellar Gallery, Târgu Mureș. Photograph: Zoltán Kovács
InSITU
28 March 1998 20 May 1998

The term in situ means: in the original place.

The activity of the ARTeast Foundation is consciously East-Central European in character; alongside its connection to the European and Global art scene, it also tries to implant itself into the everyday reality of the town. The majority of small town alternative art spaces focus on the exhibition opening, and aren’t really part of the constant circuit of town life; this is the reason why, in the case of In Situ, the once-opened exhibition is turned into a series of openings.

In the In Situ exhibition series, art was made available to the general public in the proximity of the artists’ studios: in the Cellar Gallery at no.5 Bolyai Square (which functioned between ’93 and ‘98). The space was occupied each week by the individual project of a different artist. For this reason, the “embeddedness in a specific situation” which the title implies also refers to a more active artwork-viewer dynamic: the artwork finds its natural place in the exhibition opening. In the case of the In Situ series, the opening wasn’t merely an inauguration of a permanent display, but the event of the complex encounter itself with the work of art (object, sculpture installation, assemblage, environment, photo- and videoinstallation, performance, interactive works), with the potential to form communities within its public. – Kata Ungvári Zrínyi