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TEAM

Oana Drăgulinescu

founder

With extensive experience in coordinating communication campaigns for non-governmental organizations, Oana Drăgulinescu has over two decades of involvement in cultural journalism, as well as in the creation and promotion of cultural and social events. She is the founder of communication agencies focused exclusively on social and cultural projects – Connect Media and Quartz Records – and the President of Q-Arts Association. Over time, she has managed the communication for significant cultural projects such as the “Madrigal – Marin Constantin” National Chamber Choir, Night of Museums, and the Stradivarius Tour. Her academic background includes a degree in Musicology from the National University of Music Bucharest, a master’s in Communication and Public Relations, and British Cultural Studies. Oana also coordinates the development and events strategy of the Museum of Abandonment.

Ioana Călinescu

co-founder

Ioana Călinescu is licensed in Ethnology (as a graduate of the Ethnology and Folklore Department of the Faculty of Letters at the University of Bucharest) and is currently a PR and communication specialist at the National Museum of Contemporary Art, as well as a co-founder, journalist and communication specialist at the Centre of Documentary Photography. For a long time, she has been documenting the child protection system in countries around the Black Sea and has written about what really happens beyond what appears in documents, about the impact on the lives of children, about genuinely functional models in neighbouring countries, with their less-than-perfect, corrupt, under-financed systems, with a similar level of economic development, with flawed legislation and often nonexistent implementation methodology (People in the Front Line). She has also published an article about the reformation of the child protection system in Georgia, written following a journalistic grant-supported visit financed by the Ministry of External Affairs in partnership with the United Nations on development issues.

Simina Bădică

curatorial consultant,
co-founder

Simina Bădică has been a curator at the House of European History in Bruxelles since 2018. Her most recently curated exhibition, Fake for Real. A History of Forgery and Falsification, was inaugurated in October 2020. Between 2006 and 2017 she was a researcher and curator at the National Museum of the Romanian Peasant, where she has coordinated the Image Archive and the Witness magazine. She has a PhD in History from the Central European University in Budapest with a thesis on the museification of Communism in Romania. She teaches museology at the Visual Studies and Society MA Programme within the Faculty of Political Science of the SNSPA. She has participated in many international research programmes on the topic of recent history, controversial collections and museums, and has published several articles and volume chapters on this subject. She organises exhibitions and museum exploration projects on themes connected to recent history, traumatic history, anthropology and Communist and post-Communist experiences.

Iulia Țurcanu

social media and communication coordinator

Iulia Țurcanu is a communication specialist with over 10 years of experience in public relations, event management and graphic design. She studied Audio-Visual Communication at the “Ion Luca Caragiale” National University of Theatre and Cinematography  and spent five years coordinating communication for the Czech Centre, one of the most active cultural institutes in Bucharest. She is the producer of the podcast Cel mai frumos joc, about the social life around football. She is currently working on cultural and social projects in collaboration with NGOs such as Hope and Homes for Children Romania, Societatea de Educație Contraceptivă și Sexuală and Asociația pentru Educație, Dezvoltare și Implicarea Tineretului.

Iris Șerban

digital archivist, museologist

She started working at the Ethnological Archive as a young researcher and curatorial assistant. At present she is coordinating a team of researchers and artists responsible with preserving, conserving, documenting and curating archive funds dating from the end of the 19th century to the present. Some of the projects she has been working for are: DicționAR (ongoing exhibition, 2021), La Fotograf (travelling exhibition, 2018-present), Sâmbăta Neagră a Arhivelor și Patrimoniului (2019), Rețelele privirii (online platform, 2018-present), Forumul Tradițiilor Creative (2017), Imaginea-Martor: Workshops of Performative Archive (2016).

Anca Niță

Archive digitalization coordinator

After one research paper on menstrual experiences in socialist Romania and one on menstrual shame, she continues the research with a Sociology Phd at University of Bucharest, where she is also an associated teacher. For six years she volunteered in foster care centres, working directly with beneficiaries, organising educational programs for them. The interest and passion for working with archives started while volunteering at the Archive of Images from National Peasant Museum, where she learned the tools needed in digitalization and in opening an archive to the general public. 

Mirela Petrică

digitisation asistent and archive research

Mirela Petrică is a graduate of the Faculty of Letters, specializing in Ethnology, Cultural Anthropology, and Folklore, at the University of Bucharest, where she focused on the field of digital ethnography. She is currently engaged in research at the “Constantin Brăiloiu” Institute of Ethnography and Folklore of the Romanian Academy. She gained experience at the Image Archive of the National Museum of the Romanian Peasant, where she worked on digital transcription, archival description, and documentation. At the Museum of Abandonment, she contributes to the “Map of Abandonment” project through digitization and archival documentation, also coordinating teams of volunteers and students in the digitization process. Additionally, she serves as a mediator in the museum’s exhibitions, offering visitors guided tours, including in VR format, for an immersive experience.

Ina Alecxă

digitisation and archive research

Ina Alecxă is part of the archiving team and participates in the digitization and processing of the archive, specifically in photo editing. She has been a member of the museum since the summer of 2022, initially joining as a volunteer for the digitization of the Romanian Angel Appeal archive. Currently, she is a graduate of the Advanced Sociological Research master’s program at the Faculty of Sociology and Social Work. She completed her bachelor’s thesis with an anthropological approach on public discourses about race and ethnicity in the Romanian context, with a focus on political correctness. Her research interests revolve around social issues, anthropology and discourse, contemporary history, and communism in Romania.

Ana Maria Ciobanu

research and audio storytelling

Ana Maria Ciobanu is a journalist and podcast creator (e.g., Satul Mădălinei, Obiceiul pământului). She has written for DoR (Decât o Revistă), focusing on topics such as identity, social inequality, child protection system reform, civic victories, domestic violence, extreme poverty, and racism. She has authored multiple narratives about the former child protection system and has explored abandoned institutions in her effort to closely trace this history. At the museum, she writes and edits the On the Trail of Abandonment podcast and contributes to MA’s research efforts by documenting institutional records for the Map of Abandonment, defining terms for the Dictionary, and unraveling the history of the protection system.

Bogdan Firețeanu

Web Consultant

With 20 years of experience in the digital world, Bogdan’s comprehensive understanding of this fueld comes from the different roles he has held, ranging from art director to IT manager and web consultant. In addition, his work as a development lead and integration chief for leading digital agencies around the globe provided him with a Fortune 500 client services background. Currently focused on the role Emotional Intelligence plays in organisations, specifically as it relates to the creation and development of effective leadership and high-performing, remote teams.

Immersive and VR exhibitions

Ciprian Făcăeru

stage designer of virtual immersive spaces

He is a designer of interactive media experiences and an architect/ stage designer of virtual immersive spaces, a new media artist and a futurist. With more than 6 years of experience in the new interactive immersive media within the spectre of mixed reality (MR – AR, XR, VR), his activities in consultancy, technological and artistic research, art, design, production and development converge towards the fascinating future of innovative creative techonological solutions. His mission is to explore, create, and discover new forms of communication, artistic experiences, and artistic forms by means of creative technological solutions, a direction which generates technological innovation in the fields of art, design and communication, as well as new creative perspectives in the newly-developing domains of technology.

Sabin Șerban

XR lead developer

Sabin is a co-founder, XR application designer and lead developer, at Augmented Space Agency. His
passion for technological systems coveys towards a pragmatic design and development approach
that delivers stable and sustainable software infrastructures for AR, VR and MR projects.

Cosmin Bloju

scanning specialist

An architect and specialist in 3D scanning methods applied in architecture and heritage conservation,
Cosmin uses a wide range of 3D scanning technologies and state-of-the-art methods for processing and editing scanned data.

Dan Făcăeru

XR developer and interaction designer

Dan is an XR developer and interaction designer at Augmented Space Agency. His product design background and interests in ergonomy complement his current activity focused on the expanding
realm of human-computer interactions.

Marius Hodea

3D scanning specialist

Marius is a designer specialized in virtual reality and digital production. With a vast experience in 360 video, VR creative methods and 3D scanning technologies, his focus conveys towards the new possibilities offered by digital virtualization and virtual reality visualization applied in archeology, design and arts.

Collaborators

Suzana Zeca

internal communication coordinator

Suzana Zeca has been a freelance communicator in the cultural field and collaborated with the Museum for Recent Art, as well as with independent radio stations, theatres, film festivals and product designers. She studied Philosophy at the University of Bucharest and her interest in ethics and beauty culminated in the current project of coordinating internal communication within the Museum of Abandonment, where she brings her empathetic, curiosity-rich contribution to a process that has become essential to her at a personal level. Suzana is the mother of Ilinca and Zaharia, from whom she learns incessantly.

Andrei Lupu

photo and video

Andrei Lupu graduated from the Faculty of Film Image of the Hyperion University in Bucharest. He has been working in this field for 13 years and was responsible for film image and production for short, medium-length and feature films such as Crima si pedeapsa (director> John Gostin), Smokers (director> Louis Mandylor), Adrenaline (director> Max Cerchi), The Conspiracy (director> François Mequer). Since 2019, he has extended his experiences in film production by collaborating with international film and advertising companies. He has been passionate about social photography and for the last ten years has been a dedicated creator of image stories of the most vulnerable social categories in Romania. He has been working lately with a group of the Museum of Abandonment Team, for whom he authored images used nationally in social campaigns and displayed in theme exhibitions. His first encounter with the painful aesthetics of the Hospital Home in Sighet took place seven years ago, and he is happy to have contributed through this project to memorialising the history and aesthetics of this space.

Andra Aron

video editor

She graduated from the Film-Directing Faculty within the Hyperion University and from Law School. She completed special training in photography under the supervision of Francisc Mraz for the Photopoetics course. She has worked with institutions and projects such as Clubul Țăranului, Arcub, Noaptea Muzeelor, Let’s Do It Romania, People of Romania, HHC (Hope and Homes for Children), Scena9, MNAR, Festivalul George Enescu, Cantus Mundi România and the Madrigal Choir.

Ștefania Drăghici-Oprina

communication specialist

Ștefania Drăghici-Oprina is a specialist in cultural and social communication, organizer of events
around books and art, bookseller at Seneca Anticafe, editor of books and storyteller at the Museum
of Abandonment. As the PR of Humanitas bookstores throughout the country, she opened the Humanitas bookstores in Cișmigiu and Humanitas Brașov in Piața Sfatului. As manager of a well- known Bucharest contemporary art gallery, she organized art residencies for Romanian and international artists. For 9 years, she has been part of the initial team that opened the first anticafe in Romania and organizes volunteer actions and donations for the elderly through Bunicii Noștri. Since 2022, she is social media coordinator and storyteller in the Abandonment Museum, a project that constantly inspires her to want to help people through documentation and empathetic stories.

Zoli Tóth

sound stage designer

Zoltan “Zoli” Tóth is a musician, interpreting artist, composer, ecology activist, radio programme broadcaster and percussion teacher. He founded the SISTEM (2000) band, which won Romania its first prize in the Eurovision competition alongside Luminița Anghel with the Let Me Try hit in 2005. As an ecologist, he has supported numerous NGOs and environment projects such as Greenpeace România, WWF România, Let’s Do It, Romania!, Asociația MaiMultVerde, Asociația Recolamp etc. He currently holds concerts in the country and abroad with his new solo project, Home Alone. In 2021, Zoli TOTH launches his first solo album, Better Together.

Radu Manelici

designer

Radu Manelici is one of the Romanian designers approaching multiple fields of interest regarding the processes behind visual language. He graduated in 2008 from the Design Department of the National University of Art in Bucharest, where he has also been teaching since 2009. His activity up to now has been encompassing several sections of design (product design, editorial and letter type design). Radu is the creator of the Museum of Abandonment’s visual identity. He is one of the constant collaborators of the Museum of Abandonment team in various social projects for which he is particularly gifted. Within the team he acts as a photographer and video editor.

Ioana Drăgan

social media

Ioana Drăgan is a specialist in PR and communication. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Communication and Public Relations from the National School of Political and Administrative Studies (SNSPA) in Bucharest, and is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Marketing, Advertising and Public Relations at the University of Sheffield in the United Kingdom. Her passion for communication transcends public relations, being motivated by the desire to be part of projects that add value to society. Ioana has been involved in social and cultural projects such as Noaptea Muzeelor, Hope and Homes for Children Romania campaigns, the Talk for Youth podcast, the Myra app and campaigns on gender violence, carried out in collaboration with the Society of Contraceptive and Sexual Education. Since 2021, she is part of the Museum of Abandonment team.

Corina Doboș

historian

Corina Doboș holds a PhD in history and is a Scientific Researcher III at the National Institute for the Study of Totalitarianism (Romanian Academy). She was an Imre Kertesz Kolleg fellow in Jena (2021) and a New Europe College fellow in Bucharest (2021-2022). She is also an associate lecturer at the University of Bucharest, where she teaches the course Population and Political Construction in Postwar Romania (Faculty of History). Corina won and coordinated the grant The Making of Demographic Science in the 20th Century: Population and Development in an Eastern European Periphery (DEMOECRO), funded by CNCS-UEFISCDI (2018-2020) (demohistory.wordpress.com), and she is the editor and co-author of the volumes The Pronatalist Policy of the Ceaușescu Regime I & II (Iași, Polirom 2010, 2011).