The Institute for Multidisciplinary Research in Art (ICMA) together with the Mural Art Specialization of the Faculty of Visual Arts and Design of the “George Enescu” National University of Arts from Iași are announcing the production workshop Propositions for reclaiming – the street, the neighborhood, the city. Reimagining public space through urban interventions conducted by artist Ștefan Rusu.

Monday & Tuesday
October 27 & 28, 2025
Hours 9:00 a.m. – 3:30 p.m.

Building A, FAVD UNAGE Iași
Mural Art Department

The production workshop conducted by Ștefan Rusu within the research project Imperatives of Social Change proposes a critical and creative exploration of public space – the street, the neighborhood, the city – as terrains of confrontation between common use, power, and the collective imaginary.

According to Stavros Stavrides, public spaces are not passive and inert infrastructures, but common goods in constant negotiation. Drawing on Henri Lefebvre’s thesis on the “right to the city” and David Harvey’s analysis of neoliberal type of urbanism, participants will examine recent transformations in Iași as expressions of the tension between private interests, urban policies, and community needs.

During the workshop, the participants will map and interpret key points in the city’s fabric – marginal, abandoned, contested or potentially reactivated spaces. These field observations will form the basis of visual proposals for possible urban interventions: installations, urban furniture or performative scenarios that question the way we live and relate to our city.

The workshop will take place over two days, in a collaborative format that combines critical research, direct observation and artistic production. Its goal is to stimulate responsible and participatory urban thinking, through the activation and resemantization of public space, which will transform the city from an administered space into a reclaimed space.

Ștefan Rusu (b. 1964 in Kâietu, Moldova) – artist, curator, and urban researcher working between Chișinău, Republic of Moldova and Bucharest, Romania, currently based in Apia, Samoa Islands/South Pacific. His artistic and curatorial agenda follows a transdisciplinary approach, dealing with curatorial strategies, film production, educational platforms and cultural activism, urban research and the protection of tangible and intangible heritage.

He studied at the I. E. Repin Institute for Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, Leningrad (1986-1990) and The Academy of Arts “N. Grigorescu”, Bucharest (1990-1995) where he moved soon after the fall of Ceaușescu regime. Since the ‘90s his practice is geared towards the social and political changes in East European societies after the fall of Berlin Wall and dissolution of Soviet Union. From 2000 onward, he is involved in the evolution of KSAK Center, Chișinău where he develops curatorial and research-based projects, and later in 2005-2006 he completed the Curatorial Training Program at De Appel, Amsterdam.

Towards the end of 2012 he moved to Tajikistan, where he curated projects and public programs at Dushanbe Art Ground center. Later, after relocating to Kyrgyzstan in 2016 he initiated a research platform Insular Modernities – that explores urban context and architectural heritage, mapping the status of public spaces and the actors of urban activism in Central Asia and Eastern Europe.

Ștefan is the editor of publications: Spaces on the Run (2015), Reimagining the New Man (2014), Chișinău-Art, Research in the Public Sphere (2011). In 2012 he directed Reclaiming the City documentary commissioned by 7th Berlin Biennial (Forget Fear). His most recent publication – Architectural Guide – CHIȘINĂU was produced in collaboration with DOM publishers, Berlin in 2022 that documents the post-war period of the city’s urban modernization.

The workshop is open to all students of the Faculty of Visual Arts and Design, subject to the availability of places, with priority given to students from the Mural Art department. To declare your interest, please send an email to: arta.murala@gmail.com.

The research project Imperatives of Social Change is managed by teaching lecturer Andrei Timofte, and funded by The Institute for Multidisciplinary Research in Art within the “George Enescu” National University of Arts from Iași through the internal research grants for the year 2025.