Aliona Ciobanu

“What to memorise? What to forget?” is a project that explores the collective memory embodied in monuments and collective sites aiming to present an alternative perspective of shared sites of remembrance that were part of ideological dogma. Through an iterative process of impressing images onto aluminium, through melting and remoulding stories the works allows further perspectives, stepping out of political narratives to tell the story of time. The aluminium pottery, widely-used in everyday objects, when used as a part of public and private contexts in Moldova, melts stories of the material into monuments. The stories are shaped by the fluidity of metal: they intertwine and form ongoing narratives.

Process book

Becoming is a part of the What to memorise? What to forget? project. A piece cut and melted from main What to memorise? What to forget?, melted into a story about designing a new society, that will serve the political agenda. Adding new material like cutlery and plates to the main work, the piece capture the scene of kids having lunch at the kindergarten in an ongoing developing city.

Collapse is part of the What to memorise? What to forget? project. Fluid aluminum is molding the story of a fictional hero who received intense support during the Soviet era but was rapidly abandoned after the Union's collapse. The "hero" remains an element of public space, abandoned and falling apart. A monument to a reshaped and colonized memory.

Melted, a landscape of a collective labour. Shaped into petrified potato flower, a story of long, hot and dry summer, of picking vegetables as part of social life in the name of one togetherness. Now, most of those places are almost abandoned, continuously melting back into the land, by nature, leaving that ruined after taste.

Man eating soup is part of the What to memorise? What to forget? project, melted into the main piece, was a story of a every day. Melted from pots, aluminium objects, cheap and mass produced during Soviet times, now serve as historical artifacts. Cooking a soup becoming a metaphor of the complex process of colonization. Cooking soup becomes a metaphor for the complex process of colonialism. Could the objects used as personal commodities be untangled from the overall narrative?

Privacy is a part of the What to memorise? What to forget? project. The works investigate the privacy of memory. An intangible at first glance thing, breaks in front of propaganda, becomes vulnerable and infiltrated. Could thoughts even be private?

The work delves into desire for personal fulfillment and happiness while acknowledging the toll of constant emotional interaction and the difficulty in building meaningful connections. The metal garden is a metaphor for

The flower Astenia describes an episode in which the body lacks or has lost strength, either as a whole or in any of its components. In the context of the work Metal garden, the usb flower makes the link between cold and sharp, artificially build image from outside, and vulnerability and insecurity of the inside.

Since the Republic of Moldova became independent, the country faces a difficult socio-economic situation. As a consequence, the vast majority of the population was forced to migrate temporarily or permanently abroad, to seek employment or education. The Internet became a prominent space to facilitate the reunion of families. The transition influenced the way culture is practiced and shared in Moldova. In this context Aliona investigates the production of her home country's culture, specifically oral tradition. A culture owned and shaped by the community, reflecting its current social life. The production of Moldova’s culture used to take place near people's houses or locations they activate, in spots organized and built according to their needs. Following the transition, Aliona’s installation seeks to revive the place where tradition was formerly practiced and offer an adapted version of it in the current context. She mimics the method of production, as a research form, questioning its authenticity.