{"id":282,"date":"2013-03-09T22:04:39","date_gmt":"2013-03-09T22:04:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/?p=282"},"modified":"2016-09-26T13:10:06","modified_gmt":"2016-09-26T13:10:06","slug":"cenzura-si-colectivizare-istoria-unui-spectacol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/2013\/03\/09\/cenzura-si-colectivizare-istoria-unui-spectacol\/","title":{"rendered":"Censorship and Collectivization. The Story of a Performance"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Mihaela Michailov<\/strong><\/p>\n

On September 15 1958, \u201cFani Tardini\u201d Theatre in Gala\u0163i hosted the premiere of\u00a0The Barefoot Bride<\/b>, a play directed by Valeriu Moisescu. The text of the play \u2013 written by S\u00fct\u0151 Andr\u00e1s in 1950 \u2013 centers on the Soviet-inspired collectivization process which took place in Romania between 1949 and 1962, a process which entailed the agglutination of farmland into collective farms.<\/p>\n

The Barefoot Bride<\/b>\u00a0was staged nine times at the theatre in Gala\u0163i and once in Bucharest during the\u00a0Decade of the Theatre<\/i>, after which it was cut. Valeriu Moisescu\u2019s performance included Gheorghiu-Dej\u2019s speech in which he announced the end of the collectivization process in certain parts of the country. The speech came after peasants in Vrancea County rebelled against collectivization. During these rebellions, several peasants were killed and many others were detained and deprived of their possessions.\u00a0The Barefoot Bride\u00a0<\/b>premiered one year after the reprisal of the peasants\u2019 rebellions.<\/p>\n

\"N.<\/a>In 2012, directors Alexandru Berceanu and Ioana P\u0103un designed an art installation based on the story of this cancelled performance. In\u00a01958-1958. Submerging and Subversive Installation<\/b>, the visitors receive guidance manuals for the materials that are neatly arranged on a table, they sign a minute and they read a comic strip which they can modify and become censors themselves. The installation questions the meaningless language of written reports, both then and now.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Storm\u00a0<\/b>by Ostrovski and\u00a0The Barefoot Bride\u00a0<\/b>caused such a buzz that theatre reviewers barely had enough space to manifest themselves in the press for the next couple of years. Labels such as \u201cexcessive theatricality\u201d, \u201cgratuitous virtuosity\u201d, \u201cPiscatorian agitation theatre\u201d or \u201cformalism\u201d went parallel with sometimes exaggerated words of praise to create a long-lasting impression of me as a \u201ctabloid director.\u201d A critic would later call me a test-pilot and I have to say it flattered me.\u201d (Valeriu Moisescu,\u00a0Persisten\u021ba memoriei<\/b>\u00a0[The Persistence of Memory], Funda\u021bia Cultural\u0103 Camil Petrescu, Revista Teatrul Azi, Bucure\u0219ti, 2007, p. 29)<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Barefoot Bride<\/b>\u00a0by\u00a0S\u00fct\u0151 Andr\u00e1s\u00a0(Fragments)<\/p>\n

[\u2026]\u00a0The mother<\/b>: I thought you signed up for the collective, too.<\/p>\n

Coci\u015f<\/b>: I did, I filled in the form, but you know how people are. I left home, but sat for a bit in front of the church. Lit a cigarette. And then I started thinking about things.<\/p>\n

The mother<\/b>: I\u2019ve been losing a lot of sleep over this, too, Mihai. But after I joined, I calmed down. What was on your mind?<\/p>\n

Coci\u015f<\/b>: Pretty much everything. I thought about what happened, about the way things are, about the way they might turn out\u2026 I left home determined to stop this fretting. To join the collective! Whatever happens. I felt embarrassed to keep worrying about it. I\u2019ve been losing sleep over it for the past two months. So I started thinking, 12 acres of land, 2 good oxen, a new cart, a harrow\u2026 it\u2019s not peanuts. It didn\u2019t fall out of the sky. I earned it with these two hands of mine.<\/p>\n

The mother<\/b>: People work so hard.<\/p>\n

Coci\u015f<\/b>: If only they\u2019d understand. If they walked in my shoes for just one day. If they knew how me an Cati saved for all this\u2026 we starved, walked around in shabby clothes. The bank owned us\u2026<\/p>\n

The mother<\/b>: Come on, Mihai, join the collective.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Mihaela Michailov On September 15 1958, \u201cFani Tardini\u201d Theatre in Gala\u0163i hosted the premiere of\u00a0The Barefoot Bride, a play directed by Valeriu Moisescu. The text of the play \u2013 written by S\u00fct\u0151 Andr\u00e1s in 1950 \u2013 centers on the Soviet-inspired collectivization process which took place in Romania between 1949 and 1962, a process which entailed the agglutination of farmland into collective farms. The Barefoot Bride\u00a0was staged nine times at the theatre in Gala\u0163i and once in Bucharest during the\u00a0Decade of the Theatre, after which it was cut. Valeriu Moisescu\u2019s performance included Gheorghiu-Dej\u2019s speech in which he announced the end…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[80],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=282"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3473,"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282\/revisions\/3473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artapolitica.ro\/gazetapolitica\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}