Banat Museum

Artists: CROSSLUCID, Maren Dagny Juell, Rohini Devasher, Anna Godzina, Cristian Răduță, Katarina Petrović, Anca Munteanu Rimnic, Saša Tkačenko, Kata Tranker

Curatorial team: Cristina Bută, Monica Dănilă, Edith Lázár, Ann Mbuti, Adrian Notz, Cristina Stoenescu, Georgia Țidorescu

In 1515, Albrecht Dürer created his renowned Rhinocerus in response to a strange encounter: the first rhino since antiquity to travel to the European continent. But Dürer had never seen the depicted animal. Ganda, by its Gujarati name, drowned before reaching its destination. Its voyage around the world mapped a geopolitical trajectory and reminds us that less-known stories of exploitation and violence overshadowed the histories of exploration and discovery. Engaging with other works of fiction, such as Eugène Ionesco’s Theatre of the Absurd entitled Rhinocéros, the biennial follows the stories inspired by Ganda, reclaiming the imaginative play of science and art in an entangled world marked by environmental and societal transformations.

The Huniade Castle, one of the oldest buildings in Timișoara, of mediaeval origin, not only embodies the past, but it also shelters it, housing the history and natural science branches of the Banat Museum. What would it mean to create breaches in the linearity of recorded events and knowledge-making? Alternatives of artistic scientific research reframe the often taken-for-granted inventories. Forms of invention and speculation intertwine with the scientific method and objective observations, allowing multiple temporalities to unfold and, thus, instigating other ways of narrating the world.