When was the last time you looked inside yourself?
How connected is your inner experience to the perception of the Universe in which you live?
How can the Cosmos determine your experiences and what is the line between dependent and independent?
Here are some of the questions that the artist Livia Mateias invites us to explore through a pictorial foray into her universe. Beyond the inner and outer lies the one-sided infinity, like the Mobius strip that reminds us of the limitless potential of a human being.
One might add a few more questions here to enrich the creative exploration:What is the meaning of life?
Who am I?
What does my universe look like?
Is the cosmos within me or outside me?
These are themes and topics for reflection that do not necessarily await a concrete answer, but which are left to germinate and grow into new questions with "even greater enigmas", as Lucian Blaga would say.
Inner Cosmos is an exhibition about infinity, which proposes a kind of inner reverie and an opening of the spirit towards a pictorial universe at the intersection of the real and the imaginary, between the possible and the utopian.
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Livia Mateiaș is a visual artist, a free and creative spirit. She has a Bachelor's, Master's and Doctorate degree from the Faculty of Arts and Design Timișoara and a Master's degree in Management from the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration Timișoara. She is a member of the Union of Plastic Artists from Romania since 2009 and the co-founder of the art and design studio artouching (2014) and the platform DIGITAL:CANVAS\ (2018). She attended courses in contemporary dance, art counseling, social and cultural entrepreneurship, cultural mediation, project management and volunteer management. As forms of artistic expression, she uses graphics, painting, digital art, installation and performance, slightly adapting the technique to convey the idea.
She participates in exhibitions and artistic residencies both in Romania and abroad. Her residencies include: Gabriela Tudor, Agueda, PT (2021); Our Nature, Trieste, IT; Salzburger Kunstverein, Salzburg, AT. (2018); WASP (Working Art Space & Production), Bucharest, (2014); Max Pol Fouchet Cultural Center, Méricourt, FR (2013).
Over time, she held over 200 creative workshops for different beneficiaries (adults, young people, children, seniors and vulnerable people), activities in public spaces, in parks, in art galleries, in alternative spaces, a Buddhist monastery (Austria), on the stadium (Portugal), in refugee centers (Greece), in the penitentiary, in social centers, educational institutions etc. She initiated and implemented several funded projects in Timișoara, including Fluid, Art in the Community, Home on Earth, Fairy-tale Bridge - the creative community Crocheting Stories and Bridges, as well as the Pixel_ART project.
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𝐅rancesc Miralles is a Catalan writer, journalist and musician, born in Barcelona in 1968. Initially, he studied journalism at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, abandoned it after four months, then studied English philology, which he dropped after the third year so he could travel, and thus ended up living for a while in Croatia and Slovenia during the Yugoslav war, experience reproduced in Café Balkanic (2004). Returning to Barcelona, he studied German at the Central University. After graduation, he did a master's degree in editing. He coordinated collections of personal development, also signing some works under a pseudonym, an experience reflected in his first novel, Barcelona Blues (2005).
After obtaining the Gran Angular Prize 2001–2002 with the novel for young adults Un haiku per a l'Alícia, he decided to dedicate himself to writing. Francesc Miralles has published over time a wide variety of works of fiction and non-fiction - novels, personal development books, books for children and youth, thrillers, alone or in collaboration, some of which have been rewarded with prestigious awards and translated into 50 countries.
Together with Héctor García (Kirai), Miralles has published numerous bestsellers, including Ikigai: Japanese Secrets for a Long and Happy Life (Humanitas, 2017), The Ikigai Method: Japanese Secrets to Discover Your True Passion and achieve your goals in life (Humanitas, 2019, volume translated into more than 60 languages and which became a bestseller in the United States, England, India, Holland, Turkey, etc.) and Ichigo-ichie: The Japanese Art of Enjoying Every Moment (Humanitas, 2020).
Some of his highly appraised novels were Iubire cu "i" mic (Amor en minúscula, 2006; Humanitas Fiction, 2017), translated into 27 languages, and its sequel from 2014, Wabi-Sabi (Humanitas Fiction, 2018), as well as The Library on the Moon (La biblioteca de la Luna, 2019; Humanitas Fiction, 2020).
In 2021 he published the novel A tea at the end of the world (Un té para curar el alma; Humanitas Fiction, 2022), signed together with Ángeles Doñate. Francesc Miralles collaborates with El País Semanal, MenteSana and the Spanish National Radio and holds personal development workshops all over the world.
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The exhibition will host guided tours, events and educational workshops for students, teachers and the whole communities from Timisoara.
An inEDU / arttouching project
Partners: ESERO, Sfera Timișoara, Chest of stories, Fireflies on the canvas, Positive Romania, Transilvaniei News, Timiș Press, News for children, Radio Timișoara