Pavel Brăila exhibition to open in Bucharest before artist represents Moldova at Venice Biennale

Echoes of Harmony and Silent Cries, an exhibition encompassing works by artist Pavel Brăila, is scheduled to open at Bucharest gallery Gaep on February 27.

The exhibition, the artist’s second solo one with Gaep, features three new series of works, namely glass sculptures, ceramic objects, and paintings, which are seen as “containers of grief and solidarity.” Their meaning will be highlighted by a live performance with a professional mourner, Zamfira Ludovica Mureșan, during the opening of the exhibition.

This year, Brăila is set to represent the Republic of Moldova at the International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, the country’s first participation in the event. The pavilion presents Brăila’s project On the Thousand and Second Night, curated by Adelina Luft.

Responding to the theme of Biennale Arte 2026, In Minor Keys, the project "opens a space for reflection in which imagination and material culture operate as forms of continuity within a world undergoing transformation."

Pavel Brăila, who lives and works between Chișinău and Berlin, has participated in major international art exhibitions and film festivals. He is one of the few artists selected twice for the contemporary art exhibition documenta(documenta 11, Kassel, 2002, and documenta 14, Kassel and Athens, 2017). He also took part in Manifesta 10 (St. Petersburg, 2014) and created the artistic concept for the first Moldovan Pavilion at the World Expo (Milan, 2015). His film Definitively Unfinished was awarded at the Oberhausen International Film Festival 2009.

His works have been featured in solo or group shows at Neue Nationalgalerie (Berlin), Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (Rotterdam), Tate Modern (London), The Renaissance Society (Chicago), Kölnischer Kunstverein, Moderna Museet (Stockholm), and many more. In recent years, his work has been shown at the Art Encounters Biennial (Timișoara), Lutnița (Chișinău and Ustia), ERSTE Foundation (Vienna), Neue Galerie Graz, and Centrala (Birmingham), among others.

(Opening illustration: Pavel Brăila, Lacrimarium 18, 2026, hand-blown glass. Photo by Cătălin Georgescu, courtesy of Gaep)