Mădălina Zaharia
b. 1985, Romania
Lives and works in London
Mădălina Zaharia is an artist and filmmaker. Her film, “Public Figure” – made in collaboration with poet and performer Ryan Ormonde – won 'The best film in the national competition' prize at Bucharest International Dance Film Festival 2021 and was also part of the official selection for SQIFF 2021 (Scottish Queer International Film Festival) in Glasgow and GRRL HAUS CINEMA 2021 in Boston, MA. Recent exhibitions include: “VIDEO+RADIO+LIVE” (co-lateral event of the Art Encounters Biennial 2021), Casa Artelor, Timisoara; “So Far So Good,” Budapest Gallery, Budapest; “Viral self-portraits,” Moderna galerija (MG+MSUM), Ljubljana; Art Encounters Biennial 2019, Timisoara; “Reading as Rhythm: A Sonic Exploration of the Visual Vocabulary of Control Magazine,” Tate Exchange Liverpool (2018); “DEBT.,” Tintype Gallery (solo), London (2017); “Identify Your Limitations, Acknowledge The Periphery,” Vitrine Gallery, London (2016); “The Staging of an Exhibition,” Ivan Gallery (solo), Bucharest (2016); London Open 2015, Whitechapel Gallery, London.
Mădălina Zaharia's work is concerned with the telling and re-telling of ideas, with the continuous and unfaltering reiteration of accounts and associations. It focuses on the relationship between memory and grammar and explores the unavoidable inadequacy between remembering and representation. Each piece is an actor with a prescribed set of actions and responsibilities, a character in her investigation, a thespian dressed with all her objects and desires. The very fine line between art, design and storytelling is constantly challenged and confronted by the language and visual vocabulary employed within her creative actions, transforming the exhibition space into a stage for conceptual discourse and abstract entertainment, an arena animated by gestures, objects and meaningful shapes.
Education
2012 – Royal College of Art, London (MFA in Printmaking)
2010 – Byam Shaw School of Art, UAL, London (MFA)
2008 – University of Arts, Bucharest, Romania (BFA Cinematography and Media)
Solo Exhibitions
2022 – TristxtOTL (Ivan Gallery, Bucharest)
2017 – DEBT. (Tintype Gallery, London)
2016 – The Staging of an Exhibition (Ivan Gallery, Bucharest)
2015 – Looking London, Talking Tokio (Tintype Gallery, London)
2014 – A Well-Furnished Room (Ingrid Projects, London)
2013 – Kltz.Pmz.AAAAA! (Tintype Gallery, London)
Selected group exhibitions
2024 – ”Close:Up” San Francisco Short Film Festival 2024, Nominated for Best Experimental (Film: TristxtOTL) – upcoming; Close:Up Reykjavik Film Festival 2024, Nominated for Best
Experimental (Film: TristxtOTL) – upcoming;
2024 – ”Bye-Bye Confidence”, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest
2024 – Variables as Absence of Uniformity, Ivan Gallery in collaboration with Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm
2023 – ”I will not be sad in this world” , filmlounge 2023, Sehsaal, Vienna, curated by Maximilian Lehner;
2023- 67th BFI London Film Festival, ICA London (Film: TristxtOTL);
2023 – ”Did you watch the video too?”, Cazul 101, Summer screening
programme, Bucharest;
2023 – PULS 22, The National Museum of Contemporary Art,
Bucharest;
2023 – INVENTORY OF THE WEEK/Inventarul Saptamanii curated by Anca Rujoiu, The National Centre for Dance Bucharest, Sala Omnia; Premiering ‘Bye Bye Confidence’, a film commissioned by Asociatia Culturala Solitude Project;
2022 – Programme 2 of Visions in the Nunnery (Nunnery Gallery, London)
2021 – VIDEO+RADIO+LIVE (co-lateral event of the Art Encounters Biennial 2021), Casa Artelor, Timisoara; Secret Language, Ivan Gallery, Bucharest
2020 – So Far So Good, Budapest Gallery, Budapest; Viral self-portraits, Moderna galerija (MG+MSUM), Ljubljana
2019 – Third edition of the Art Encounters Biennial (Timișoara); MOSTYN Open 21 (Mostyn, Llandudno); The Immeasurable (Thames-Side Studios Gallery, London); PPM#4 (Aiciacolo, Cluj); The Web of Fabric (Ivan Gallery, Bucharest); Mimesis; Narrative; Against Hegemony! (APT Gallery, London); EBC023 ( East Bristol Contemporary, Bristol, UK)
2018 – <pre><history>Romanian* Art Now (Suprainfinit Gallery, Bucharest); Reading as Rhythm, Tate Exchange Liverpool (performance in collaboration with Ross Taylor as part of the Control Magazine retrospective, UK)
2017 – Tender Buttons (Salón project space, Madrid) / with Fran Meana; Mind. Language. Matter (St Mary’s House, Norwich)
2016 – Identify Your Limitations, Acknowledge the Periphery (Vitrine Gallery, London); Bench (Tintype Gallery, London); Say What? (ASC Gallery, London)
2015 – A Leap of Faith – The Living Room (St. Laurence Church, Catford, London); London Open ’15 (Whitechapel Gallery, London); An Evening with Flat i (Flat i, London); Feel the Discourse! (Guest Project, London); Hidden in Plain Sight (Norwich University of Arts Gallery, Norwich)
2014 – The Forgoten Pioneer Movement (District Kunst und Kulturforderung, Berlin)
2013 – Blue Plastic Bag (AIRstudio, Central Saint Martins, UAL) / collaboration with Ross Taylor funded by The Arts Council England; The Round Manual (Arch Collective, London)
2012 – Hospitable Plains (Brussels Arts Factory, Brussels); 2nd Exhibition (Café Gallery Projects, London)
2011 – RE-READ (Trinity Buoy Wharf, London); 1st Exhibition (Café Gallery Projects, London)
2010 – Pas Pas Cichi Cichi a Performance for the Sea (Coastal Currents, Hastings); OPEN (14 Cheshire street, London); subSTRATUM (Islington Arts Factory, London); In the Memory of Light (Kingsgate Gallery, London)
2009 – I Know a Friend That Knows a Friend (Het Poortgebouw, Rotterdam); Perfect Answers (Factory Projects, London)
2008 – Real Presence (House of Legacy, Belgrade); Archive in Residence (UNAGaleria, Bucharest); Archive in Residence (VBKO, Vienna)
2007 – The XIVth edition of Vila Nova de Cerveria Biennale (Portugal); A sangue fredo (Romanian Cultural Institute, Venice); FEMIDON (Galeria Nouă, Bucharest)
Residence and grands
2021 – Public Figure won the prize for The Best Film in the National Competition at the Bucharest International Dance Film Festival
2019 – Chelsea Arts Club Trust Award
2015 (ongoing) – Royal Academy Schools Fellowship, London
2013 – Windows Comission, AIRstudio, CSM, UAL
2012 – Augustus Martin Award
2010 – AIR residency at AIRstudio, London; Artists’ and Collectors Bursary (UAL, 2009)
2009 – Real Presence (Belgrade, Serbia)
Publications
Interview with Mădălina Zaharia https://thenameofthenextsong.com/2015/07/17/interview-with-madalina-zaharia/ (accessed 06/07/2018)
Ross Taylor, Mădălina Zaharia, “Walls with Holes in”, Control Magazine, Issue 19, 2014
[contributor to], Neru Phuyt, Issue 1, 2014
[contributor to], UM:DRUCK, Issue 25, 2013
Okwui Enwezor et alii, “The Best Exhibitions of 2013”, Art Forum International. Best of 2013, Vol. 52, No. 4, December 2013