20 July 2025, 12.00

At the International Cultural Centre in Krakow, works from the collection of Ovidiu Şandora, which is one of the most important private art collections in Central Europe, were on display from March. The exhibition, part of the Poland-Romania 2024-2025 Cultural Season, shows Romanian art of the last century as a reflection of human destiny – from the avant-garde to the present day. This is the last chance to take a curatorial tour and visit it with Dr Monika Rydiger.

The exhibition at the ICC is a story about creative freedom and constraints, the grotesque and the absurd, the triumphs and traumas of the 20th century that still resonate in contemporary art. Through the individual biographies of the artists, the curators of the exhibition have created a visual story about the fate of Romania. They also look at them from the inside through the perspective of the co-curator, the owner of the collection, Ovidiu Șandor. How does the multi-voiced narrative of the exceptional artists unfold? What do they convey to us and how do we read their story after several months of presenting the exhibition in the the ICC Gallery? We will find out during a unique guided tour, to which we invite you!

Dr. Monika Rydiger – art historian and critic, lecturer. Curator at the Gallery of the International Cultural Centre. Member of the Polish section of AICA (International Association of Art Critics), vice-president of the Association of Art Historians, Krakow Branch. Author of many texts, she specializes in modern and contemporary art, with a particular focus on sculpture and architecture.

Guided tours included in the exhibition ticket price.
The event will be held in Polish.

The exhibition “One eye laughs, the other cries. Art from Romania in the Collection of Ovidiu Şandor” is co-organized by the International Cultural Centre in Krakow and the Romanian Cultural Institute in Warsaw.

Event within the framework of the Romania-Poland Cultural Season 2024-2025

The Romania-Poland Cultural Season 2024-2025 is organized by the Romanian Ministry of Culture and the Romanian Institute of Culture, on the Romanian side, and by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, in cooperation with the Polish Institute in Bucharest, on the Polish side.