Ioana Iacob: MV’s Room

IOANA IACOB: MV’s Room

Sky Blue Oil on canvas 29 x 22 cm 2020 € 1.300 incl. VAT

In her paintings Ioana Iacob (born 1987, Romania) usually stays within the domestic realm. Iacob’s choice of motif seems often mundane if not banal, a table-top with small objects, a pair of sneakers or a part of an interior. Through her choice of images, Iacob catches a person and its surroundings off guard and exposes their most inner soul. As an acute observer of the human condition Iacob all too often exposes the most intimate and vulnerable moments.

Saucony Blue and Yellow Oil on canvas 60 x 53 cm 2020 € 2.800 incl. VAT

Take Away Coffee Oil on canvas 28 x 28 cm 2020 € 1.400 incl. VAT

Mascot Butterfly Oil on canvas 39 x 58 cm 2020 € 2.700 incl. VAT

Hand Oil on canvas 30 x 23.5 cm 2020 € 1.300 incl. VAT

For years I have been going regularly to Cluj in Romania, where one of the most active contemporary art scenes in Eastern Europe has evolved, particularly for painting. Ioana Iacob was one of the best painters I have discovered on my trips.

Skilled, down to earth, humorous and a smidge defiant.

The few times Ioana and I were in touch during the recent lockdowns, I asked her how she was doing in these particular times. “Not much has changed” she replied.” I go to the studio in the morning, I paint all day, and then I go home. It is fine for me, I love being in the studio.” And it is true, whenever I have been to the paintbrush factory in Cluj, or recently the Centrul de Interes studio complex, Ioana was always there painting, smoking, pondering.

When you look at the motifs of Ioana’s art, they are pretty much in tune with that perception. Captured moments of her studio and her domestic life. Still lives revealing snippets of daily routines and repeated gestures. Small details that speak of a larger narrative. A tranquil flow of private images, elusive and intimate, that often allude to the outside world, suggesting a far more complex existence.

(Patrick Heide)

Mircea Scrie Oil on canvas 32 x 28 cm 2020 € 1.500 incl. VAT

Mircea Arde Oil on canvas 62 x 42 cm 2020 € 2.600 incl. VAT

New Shoes Oil on canvas 33 x 35 cm 2020 € 1.700 incl. VAT

Face Off Oil on canvas 30 x 39 cm 2020 € 1.700 incl. VAT

What do we see? Objects, the usual occupants of one’s life, of one’s surroundings. Are they only objects? Is there life in them? Are they, we might ask, representing life itself? Tough question.

What is shown in these images is the touch that left each object in its precise position, in each setup or certain state. But in showing these ordinary objects, it is not about the objects themselves that we are talking about, it is about the presence left with/in them. They are, after all, someone’s objects. They find themselves in someone’s house. They were chosen by someone. In this sense we might say, they are someone. They are another body of that person.

That person or any other person, is not here/there but we can grasp their existence. We can see their life, even though we cannot see them. Maybe this is a better way to see a life, to know a life. Curiously enough, life can be best described in its absence, when it is not present as life.

Although these objects are collected and painted as a certain person’s portrait, one can see in them anyone’s portrait and empathize or relate to anyone’s actions.

As with the rolling paper and filter, something is missing, because something is always missing. It is either left like this forever or it will be completed at some point, an image of uncertainty.

The mask, apart from being any other mask is a mask worn by someone, one that was touched by someone’s lips and face, one that caught their breath.

This is what we are left with these days, this is what our life has turned into. We have no others around us, only their traces that we see in the objects they leave behind.

(Ioana Iacob)

Quit Smoking Oil on canvas 13 x 20 cm 2020 € 900 incl. VAT

After the Shower Oil on canvas 45 x 33 cm 2020 € 2.000 incl. VAT

Ucenicii Oil on canvas 62 x 44 cm 2020 € 2.600 incl. VAT

Shoes with Panties Oil on canvas 18 x 24 cm 2020 € 1.100 incl. VAT

Nearphones Oil on canvas 25 x 27 cm 2020 € 1.300 incl. VAT

Plastic Oil on canvas 30 x 30 cm 2012 € 1.500 incl. VAT

Orange Old Room Oil on canvas 25 x 35 cm 2009 € 1.500 incl. VAT

Green Heels Oil on canvas 70 x 50 cm 2008 € 3.000 incl. VAT

Coffee Maker Oil on canvas 22 x 30 cm 2020 € 1.300 incl. VAT

IOANA IACOB

Born in 1987 in Zalau, Romania Lives and works in Romania Education

From 2012 2011 2009 2002–2006

PhD, University of Art and Design Cluj-Napoca MA, University of Art and Design Cluj-Napoca, Faculty of Fine Arts BA, University of Art and Design Cluj-Napoca, Faculty of Fine Arts, Painting department Fine Arts Highschool “Romul Ladea”, Cluj-Napoca

Solo Exhibitions

2017 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009

Instructions for Being, MATCA Art Space, Cluj, Romania Umbre albe, Visual Kontakt, Oradea, Romania Collectibles, Mie Lefever Gallery, Gent, Belgium Foarte in plus, Calina Gallery, Timisoara, Romania Do not dispose after use, Anaid Art Gallery, Bucharest, Romania Stairway to Heaven, Mie Lefever Gallery, Gent, Belgium Fire, Casa Matei Gallery, Cluj, Romania Prima lecţie, Artbooth project, Cluj, Romania Untitled, LAIKA Art Space, Bucharest, Romania

Group Exhibitions

2020 2019 2018 2016 2016 2015 2013 2009 2008

Show Off 3 - Between Emergence/y and Establishment, MATCA artspace, Cluj, Romania What if you were in my shoes?, Art Museum Cluj, Romania Show off 2, MATCA artspace, Cluj, Romania Rondul de Noapte/ The Night Watch, Art Museum Cluj, Romania Soon this body will be still, MATCA artspace, Cluj, Romania Show off, MATCA artspace, Cluj, Romania Dark Smoke, Patrick Heide Contemporary Art, London, UK The Divided Woman, NUNC Contemporary, Antwerp, Belgium Hard Candy, atelier Irina M, Fabrica de pensule, Cluj, Romania The Quiet Corner, Lateral Ar Space, Paintbrush Factory, Cluj, Romania T.A.N.G.O. – turning art now gliding over, Museum of art Cluj, Romania Painting- Cluj, Galerie Martin Kudlek, Cologne, Germany Distorted Realities, LARM Galleri, Copenhagen, Denmark Young Artists from the Painting School of Cluj, Mie Lefever Gallery, Gent, Belgium 15 Romanian and Hungarian artists, Plan B Gallery, Cluj, Romania