Pocket Interiors.
A Contemporary Telematic Novel

Date & Location

2020, Bucharest

This is the story of the Patria cinema (formerly the ARO block and cinema) made by Horia Creangă in 1934. By using an AR application aimed at the plexi model, visitors can see various events and the interiors of the block. The presence of the cinema on the ground floor seems like transforming the inhabitants into a kind of actors, who in their daily life, replicate the gestures and attitudes of the films and movie posters.

ARO was by far one of the most modern cinema of its time, equipped with air conditioning and electricity. In this augmented reality fiction, we imagined the life inside it, a kind of backstage, where people play domestic scenes in a ‘fantasy dimension’.

The stories we tell are an opportunity to go through different historical moments, through the culture of Bucharest’s housing and cinema. At the same time they are the perfect medium to experiment with a new form of artistic expression between fiction, animation and technology.

Pocket Interiors- is a non-linear story made up of 15 animated micro-narratives. Although they are not chronologically linked and need no particular order to be understood, the animations piece together the interior world of the building. Each film is a collage of graphic elements cut from old almanacs, small advertisements, fashion catalogues, or movie posters. Sometimes the characters, or their silhouettes, are recognisable, other times they refer to classic sequences in a game of quotations. The sound collage that accompanies the films also makes reference to iconic performers, such as Edith Piaf or Gică Petrescu, or to an iconic sound such as a gramophone fizzing, the trumpeting of an old tram or the sound of a magnesium flash camera.

Ep. 01/15: Tiptoe
Play Video
Ep. 04/15: Coincidences
Play Video
Ep. 07/15: Espresso dublă
Play Video
Ep. 10/15: Unreel
Play Video
Ep. 13/15: Discretionary wine
Play Video
Ep. 02/15: Waiting in the rain
Play Video
Ep. 05/15: Ready Steady Cut
Play Video
Ep. 08/15: Stuck between floors
Play Video
Ep. 11/15: Bite the dust
Play Video
Ep. 14/15: Chit-chat
Play Video
Ep. 03/15: Rapirea din tramvai
Play Video
Ep. 06/15: Trag! Sar! Strig!
Play Video
Ep. 09/15: Aiurea-n tramvai
Play Video
Ep. 12/15: Frigo-fonic test
Play Video
Ep. 15/15: Radio neascultatori
Play Video

Use Artivive and try it yourselves!

To fully enjoy this exhibition – Pocket Interiors – use the ARTIVIVE application! Download and install the ARTIVIVE app on your phone for free from Google Play or the Appstore. Open the application and pin it to these drawings.
Frame each drawing as indicated. An animation will start soon.

Curators: Cosmina Goagea, Justin Baroncea, Constantin Goagea
Exhibition design, animations: Ioana Naniș, Andrei Angelescu, Emanuel Birtea, Cristina Ginara, Andrei Vîrvorea, Petre Frangulea, Iulia Panait, Alexandru Voicu, Justin Baroncea
Sound design: Alexandru Ivanof
Graphic design and visual identity: Radu Manelici
Communication: Mugur Grosu
Exhibition production: Acant Design
Place: Modul Gallery, Bucharest
Photo: Andrei Mărgulescu

Project co-financed by The Administration of the Romanian Cultural Fund – AFCN