Glimpsing Romania
This project was born in 1994 and had two goals: to broaden an on-going
exploration of ancient goddess burial sites and cave sites in order to document
visual evidence of "bee" worship and existence, and to work collaboratively with the
Romanian video artist, Marilena Preda-Sanc.
Thus began a two-year process of further research and correspondence in laying the
ground work for a 6-week journey in 1996 to the remarkable,
and struggling country that is Romania. Relying heavily on the well-known text
by Maria Gimbutas -- Language of the Goddess,
Nancy was able to identify 12 key sites, primarily from the Cucuteni culture
which had been dated from 5000 - 3500 BC.
She had been under the assumption that it was somehow proven or
understood that this was a matriarchal-based culture. But we were faced again and
again with resistance to this concept by every archeological
authority of this period that we encountered.
It wasn't until the very last days of our journey that a long discussion
with Dr. Magda Mantu occurred at her excavation site in Scandea -- a town northeast of
Yasi, and just below the Moldavian border, which revealed that in fact, no one can
substantiate, find evidence of, or even conceptualize the existence of the
matriarchal-based culture that Gimbutas' research suggests.
While in Bucaresti, we were able to locate and meet with Romanian video artist,
Marilena Preda-Sanc, several times.
Nancy had been sending her slides and other materials during the two years of
on-again,off-again correspondence prior to our departure. We had hoped that a modest
collaborative project could be realized. But after arriving
we learned that, due to the country's poor mail and communication
services, Marilena did not know the dates we were going to be in Romania and had
made plans to be in Bulgaria for most of June on an artist's residency.
Well, that was that, you might say.
But no.
Side trips through the Transylvanian mountains, to Brasov and Sinai . . .
the family of bee-keepers we encountered tending their hives a long the road to
Constanza, and the tiny town of Fiori Nord, nestled on the
shores of the Black Sea, all provided the most delightful unexpected situations
and encounters.
We returned home with full documentation of a rich and fruitful experience.
There is much more to do . . .
Jan Blair & Nancy Macko
about this project:
The images and journal text on this web site are part of
a larger exhibition which includes additional images and the video taped
discussion with Dr. Magda Mantu, archeologist, at her excavation site in Scandea.
The show, entitled, Glimpsing Romania, was first presented as part of the
1998 Women Artists Series at the Mary Douglass Library, Douglass College,
Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N.J. Since that time it has been exhibited at the
University of Texas at Dallas, Scripps College in Claremont, CA and Whittier
College in Whittier, CA. In 1999, the images were published in Volume XX of
Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies by Washington State University Press.
technical information:
The images presented in the exhibition are comprised of
digitally enhanced stills and video footage output as 30" X 40" Light Jet
digital prints (stills), and 10" X 50" Cactus digital prints (video).