Southern Romania: Over 100 artists turn industrial site in Ploiești into ‘temporary museum’

More than 100 artists from Romania and around the world are presenting their work in Ploiești, a city 60km north of Bucharest, ahead of the fifth edition of the annual urban art event Artown NOW.

UZUC, a plant with a history spanning more than 120 years, occupies a site covering 100,000 sqm. More than 3,000 people once worked there, and the plant’s halls produced, among other things, the spheres of the Atomium, Brussels’ famous landmark. Today, the factory continues to operate on a smaller scale, while part of the site has become a hub housing music studios, furniture and automotive workshops, a printing house, and a manufacturer of highway road barriers.

Now, the urban art festival will activate 50,000 sqm of the total site. The approximately 2,600 sqm covered by murals created for this edition will add to another 100 murals and more than 350 artistic interventions created since 2022.

It will create a museum “that exists only for as long as it is inhabited,” the organizers explained. “While artists and visitors are there, the factory becomes a museum, then returns to its normal rhythm of work. It is temporary because it functions as a museum only for the duration of the event. It is contra-temporary because the traces left behind, namely the murals, sculptures and interventions, remain permanent. And it is contemporary because it brings together artists and practices from today’s art scene.”

At UZUC, the artists draw inspiration from what the factory itself has to offer. Sculptures, installations, and text and portrait interventions are created from salvaged pieces recovered from the factory halls, giving the site a new identity.

Brazilian artist Adriano Bohra, known as Robolito, is carving wood and painting three industrial cylinders, while Spenser Little (United States) is shaping metal and has already completed around 20 text and portrait interventions. Misha Diaconu (Romania) is sculpting and welding metal, while Ploiești-based ceramic artist Liliana Maria is adding porcelain to the same work. Italian architects Andrea Ariano and