Looking at Andrei Nacu

The Romanian documentary photographer Andrei Nacu was featured as a guest lecturer for Falmouth University on February 5th 2020. The following are notes and insights personally mine, gleaned from the lecture.

Fig. 1: Nacu 2018. Mining in Deposits of Light (Screenshot of video by author)

"In his creative practice he is using documentary photography, the family album and the photographic archive to create stories which analyze the junction between personal memory and social history. His most recent work includes video, installation and performance and focuses on the politics of representation and media archaeology."  see more at: http://andreinacu.ro/index.php/info/about/

Nacu grew up in Romania, and studied there as well.  Starting with a passion for visual art and photo journalism and eventually ended up studying at Falmouth.

There he started some new approaches to his work including longer term projects and more intimate, like his project, A Family Holiday, where he spent some weeks with a Polish family on holiday in a van, spending day and night with them, to tell their story. 

Fig. 2: Nacu. A Family Holiday.

Looking through the collection he did an amazing job capturing the story.  I particularly loved his use of light and motion in the images.  And the natural and fluid movements.  It's interesting to me that a family would allow this and I wonder how intimate their relationship with Andrei was.  But when their children are grown it will be an amazing gift. 

Listening to Andrei he seems to do a good job at obtaining funding for his projects.  This is something I would love to know more about as this is something I have not been successful yet.

He stretched himself as a photographer when he began his final Falmouth project with photographing his parents. Here I was surprised to learn he was not trying to tell their story, but capture larger issues. In The Forsaken Garden Time is a Thief was published in a book as well.  Showing the social and political change in Romania, as his parents lived it.  He tried to give his parents their own voice in the project as well, giving them cameras and involving them in the image selection.

I liked how he went for an unconventional gallery space in one project where he ended up hanging images on the stairway up and down the flats.  What an amazingly great idea for those involved.  This reinforces my effort to look for a non-traditional gallery space as well. 

Nacu is definitely more political in his projects, such as in the project, In Almost Every Frame, or Witness where he questions the role of the Romanian people, the hangman and the victim and who is who.

I think Andrei Nacu is quite adapt at noticing what is around him and gleaning inspiration in letting both current and historical events as well as inanimate objects guide his work.  

I appreciate how he follows his passion and his circle of influence to create a voice. 

Figure 1. Andrei NACU. 2018. Mining in Deposits of Light. [online] Available at: http://andreinacu.ro/index.php/project/-mining-in-deposits-of-light/ [accessed 24 February 2020].

Figure 2. Andrei NACU. A Family Holiday.  [online] Available at: http://www.oitzarisme.ro/2010/11/26/andrei-nacu-vama-veche-a-family-holiday/ [accessed 24 February 2020]. 

NACU, Andrie. 2020. Interview by Falmouth University. [online] Available at: https://recordings.reu1.blindsidenetworks.com/falmouth/e2ec98a71ae304ec65ffec33985ce021cd0f3521-1580925237148/capture/