Untitled (from the Amerim series) 1997

Curator: Looking at this piece, the first thing that springs to mind is pure, unadulterated joy. The colours, the composition, it’s all so playfully simple. Like a child's building blocks but with an artist's knowing wink. Editor: I see something quite interesting in that simplicity. We're looking at an untitled linocut from the ‘Amerim’ series by Vasile Dobrian, created in 1997. The abstract forms trigger primal architectural memories: a threshold, a gateway, rendered in earth tones and that vivid green, suggestive of growth and passage. Curator: A gateway, yes! It also reminds me of those old-school computer games, where you’d move your little pixelated character through similar archways. Nostalgic and strangely hopeful. But gateways to what, exactly? Maybe just the next level, literally? Editor: Precisely, the artist invites that ambiguity. The square suspended above—perhaps a sun, a window, or just a shape—carries a weight of symbolic potential. Squares often represent stability and the rational world, whereas arches historically signify transition, linking disparate realms. Think of Roman aqueducts, or triumphal arches… Curator: Triumphal… hmm. I initially saw this piece as light-hearted, but now with this added weight, this triumph... it gets interesting. Perhaps it’s the artist's own triumph, marking a passage, a new exploration with printmaking in '97? It’s all linocut which provides an earthy texture to the piece; the effect feels hand-made and approachable. Editor: And note how Dobrian has harnessed the inherent qualities of linocut: bold lines and planar surfaces, devoid of shading. That intensifies the graphic power, the immediacy. Also notice, the background colour is not precisely symmetrical in its borders within the framing of the white page. It all makes you feel very grounded within its composition. Curator: Grounded, I feel it too. There is that almost primal directness. But if we stick with the gateway symbolism—is it an invitation or a warning? Perhaps that tension, that beautifully balanced uncertainty, is the artwork's triumph in the end. Editor: A poignant thought. Dobrian's image is indeed like a signpost, directing not towards a literal place, but inward, towards the ever-shifting landscapes of our own perceptions and the symbolic language we use to navigate them.