Tudor Ciurescu's 'ELEGIA' at VUNU Gallery, Vienna

VUNU gallery in Vienna presents 'ELEGIA', the second solo exhibition of Lausanne-based artist Tudor Ciurescu, running from March 26 to May 9, 2026. The show assembles sculptural and pictorial works that probe the visual afterlife of authority—how systems like psychoanalysis, religion, science, and political ideology persist through images even after their claims to certainty have eroded. A central reference is Dušan Makavejev's 1971 film 'W.R.: Mysteries of the Organism', which features a portrait of Wilhelm Reich turned into a dartboard. Ciurescu reuses this motif, alongside images of Freud, to navigate themes of desire, the death drive, and power. Works include 'L'urgenza Eterna' (2026), a sculpture of copulating rabbits, and 'The Prapor / Vera Renczi' (2026), depicting a Romanian serial killer within a religious Orthodox frame. The exhibition's title derives from 'Elegia Capensis', a flower whose silver-coated 3D scan appears in a work. Ciurescu's method involves assembling eerie images from Eastern Europe, the West, religious iconography, and corporate culture, framed in dark brown wood that evokes bourgeois coldness. The show reflects on a moment when fascism proliferates and emancipation dissipates, offering a disorienting map of desire and ideology.