Florin Mitroi: Ch. I: Winter

22 years after his premature disappearance, Florin Mitroi remains a constant revelation. Solitary and enigmatic, a Stakhanovite of deferred suicide, Florin Mitroi is the author of a colossal body of work in terms of size and unfathomable in depth.

In his thousands of works, two contrasting vectors converge: the unbearable pain of existence, intertwined with a formal perfectionism unparalleled in postwar Romanian art. His art electrifies the soul and delights the eye.

From tenderness to fear and from sarcasm to self-irony, Florin Mitroi's work is a veritable grammar of emotions, vitally necessary in times of rampant affective depletion of the creative act. Florin Mitroi is an orthographic guide for those who know they can feel more, feel stronger.

Even after his solo exhibitions at Schipper and Johnen galleries in Berlin, and group shows at Kunsthalle Wien or Lenbachhaus Munich, Florin Mitroi's work remains a construction site in the abyss. The series of exhibitions Florin Mitroi at Arsmonitor, starting with Ch. I: Winter, maps the edge of this abyss. Works on wood, glass, and canvas, in galvanized metal or on paper, outline the contours of doubt bearing the name Florin Mitroi, presented - for the first time in an exhibition - with examples from his rich and relevant photographic production.

Ch. I: Winter is about the freeze within a fevered mind.

(Curated by Erwin Kessler)