Post-Industrial Stories

source: anti-utopias

Since October 2012, Ioana Cîrlig and Marin Raica started working on Post-Industrial Stories, a long term documentary project, photographing Romania’s mono-industrial communities. They rented out their apartment in Bucharest and moved to Brad, an ex-mining small town in Western Romania.

Brad that used to have a gold mine, a coal mine and a factory that produced mining equipment. About 7000 people used to work here until 2006 when the mines got closed down.

Over the next 2 years we will be moving around the country, living in small towns and documenting the effects that de-industrialisation had on the landscape and the people.

Romania has been heavily industrialized in it’s over 40 years of communism. Every town had a industrial center and people from all over the country were moved to urbanize the areas around mines and factories. Huge industrial centers were built in rural areas, changing the landscape completely. The factory workers and the miners were the country’s pride, idealized and portrayed as heroes.

After the fall of communism in 1989, most of the industrial centers have been closed, living whole communities jobless.

We are studying the way mono-industrial communities cope with the loss of their central activity, the depression that these places experience.
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source: mutantspace

Ioana Cîrlig and Marin Raica’s ‘Post Industrial Stories’ photo project promises to show us a different, more nuanced. heartfelt side of Romania and its people. It is a timely project for Romania is a place often derided by the European chattering classes. All we know of the country is that Romanian gypsies flood our cities begging for money, they executed their former leader, the megalomaniac Nicolae Ceaușescu, in 1989 and that it’s the birthplace of Count Dracula. To many people Romania is a mystery, a collection of derogatory stereotypes. This project promises to give more depth, more blood to a proud country that stands at the cultural heart of Europe.
Ioana Cîrlig and Marin Raica have thrown down the gauntlet and embarked on an ambitious journey through the post industrial heartland of their country to document the catastrophic results of communist collective industrialisation in the rural regions of Romania. To live, talk and capture the lives of the people who Ceauşescu turned from farmers into miners and then left bankrupt after his regime collapsed in on itself.
Ultimately the two photographers will be posing tough questions about the abuse of power and it’s consequences on ordinary people – the impact of de-industrialisation, unemployment and poverty – and to do that they need time to get to the heart of their subject matter. And time costs money so they are currently looking for funding. And here’s why:
For at least 16 months we will be visiting 27 areas across central and eastern Romania, travelling a total of around 12000 km. We will journey in places with an established tradition in the mining and processing of natural resources (Roșia Montană, Zlatna, Brad), mining towns that have in time attracted workers from all around Europe (Anina, Oravița, Ciudanovița, Ștei, Băița) and relatively recent communities established around potential natural resources sites (Valea Jiului, Călanul Nou, Moldova Nouă). We will try and live in each area for a few months, see as much as we can and integrate in the local communities to the extent that we are allowed.
To afford this in depth portrait, we need to buy time and resources. We’ll need money for gas, filmstock, lab work and all sorts of day to day living expenses. (nothing fancy, just a coffee in the morning to get us up and running, and a room where our stories gathered over the day can rest).
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source: dilemavechero

Proiectul nostru documentează efectele dezindustrializării în România. „Post-Industrial Stories“ spune povestea comunităţilor din localităţile industriale ale României, prin studiu fotografic pe termen lung. Timp de patru ani, ne mutăm prin ţară, din oraş în oraş.
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source: descoperaro

Post-Industrial Stories este este un proiect de documentare fotografică pe termen lung realizat de Ioana Cîrlig şi Marin Raica. Timp de o lună cei doi fotografi au călătorit 3000 de kilometri prin 40 de localităţi industriale într-un road-trip finanţat de Administraţia Fondului Cultural Naţional. România a fost industrializată agresiv în anii comunismului. Fiecare oraş avea cel puţin un centru industrial. Oameni din toată ţara au fost mutaţi în colonii muncitoreşti, iar zonele din jurul minelor au fost urbanizate. Muncitorii şi minerii erau mândria ţării, cei care care asigurau dezvoltarea economică. În localităţile monoindustriale, centrul industrial reprezintă nucleul, cheia tuturor interacţiunilor sociale, principala sursă de venit, dentitatea comunităţii. Declinul industrial creează un lanţ de efecte negative în aceste zone: şomaj, sărăcie, migraţia populaţiei, degradarea peisajului urban, creşterea infracţionalităţii. “De când s-a închis mina, aici totul e mort. Singurii cu un venit sigur sunt pensionarii”. “Post-Industrial Stories” documentează viaţa comunităţilor din aceste locuri, legatura dintre om şi mediu, personalitatea fiecărei zone precum şi peisajul industrial propriu-zis, dominant prin însemnătate şi prin statutul de punct de reper.
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source: uniuneaarhitectilorro

Ioana Cirlig si Marin Raica surprind cu empatie si perseverenta diferitele dimensiuni ale efectelor crizei sociale si economice actuale. Proiectul demarat in octombrie 2012 va dura doi ani, fiind structurat in patru etape. Cei doi fotoreporteri vor locui acesti doi ani in zonele industriale fotografiate: Brad, Petrila, Anina si Abrud, dar vor calatori si in locuri cu traditie in extragerea si prelucrarea resurselor: Rosia Montana, Zlatna, Anina, Oravita, Ciudanovita, stei, Valea Jiului, Calanul Nou, Moldova Noua.

Revista ARHITECTURA va invita sa descoperiti originalitatea fotografiilor Ioanei Cirlig si ale lui Marin Raica si relevanta continutului proiectului Post-Industrial Stories.
Proiectul independent de fotografie documentara Post-Industrial Stories este un studiu al consecintelor dezindustrializarii in Romania. Marin Raica este pasionat de fotografie de 15 ani, iar timp de 10 ani a lucrat ca fotoreporter si a avut ocazia sa cunoasca in profunzime Romania, in special zonele defavorizate. Ioana Cirlig a absolvit Imagine de Film si este pasionata de fotografie de 7 ani. A lucrat ca fotoreporter 4 ani si, din 2010, este freelancer. Vrea sa faca fotografie documentara si a visat mult timp la un astfel de proiect.
Expozitia de fotografie Post-Industrial Stories va putea fi vizitat? în mansarda redactia ARHITECTURA (Centrul de Cultura Arhitecturala al UAR, str. J. L. Calderon, nr 48, Sector 2 Bucuresti).