To cover is to work with what’s already there. Cover also means shelter. To protect or hide. To conceal or disguise, to extend over time or space. To run for cover, to cover one’s back.
cover me softly, the main exhibition of the 2024 Beta Biennial, is an exploration of covers across disciplines, mediums, and geographies. Counter to notions of copying, stealing, imitating, and bootlegging that may each come with their own ethical slant, the cover provides an alternate set of relational vocabularies for understanding how transferences of knowledge and structures of authorship are circulated through art and design. By centering our vast interconnectedness, cover me softly opens new realms of possibility for doing, making, and being.
Curated by architect Oana Stănescu, the exhibition includes the contributions of over 50 architects, designers, musicians, artists, activists, photographers, writers, directors and other interdisciplinary creators. The installations are displayed throughout the entire building of the Garrison Command, in its inner courtyard and in the public space of Libertății Square.