Andrei Costache

b. 1983, Constanta, Romania

2011-2014 BA Fine Art, University Campus Suffolk, Ipswich

Recent exhibitions

Solo Shows:
2015 ‘Salad Days Graffiti Nights’, The Cut, Halesworth
2014 ‘Cake Play’, Lookout, Aldeburgh 2013 ‘Never Ending Line’, Futura Park, Ipswich
2012 ‘Animal Safari’, Lookout, Aldeburgh

Group shows:
2014 ‘British Contemporary Painting’, Crypt Gallery, London
2013 ‘Snip’, Abbey Farm, Snape Maltings
2012 ‘The Future’, Atrium Studios, Ipswich
2012 ‘Saatchi: Revisitation’, Ipswich School of Arts, Ipswich

Awards and Residencies:
2013 Public Sculpture Winner, Never Ending Line, Aquigen and University Campus Suffolk, Futura Park, Ipswich

Artist’s Statement

My sculptures are informed by a fascination with scale and materiality. Through sculpture I believe I am identifying with the future, transformation and folklore. I am seeking to preserve volume and entice colour. I am influenced by Romanian tradition and modern structures. When you go to a place like Romania you discover the handmade culture and an attention for details. Even though some parts of the country are more frugal and undiscovered than they look. For me being there is almost as if time has stopped. What dominates is a primitive aesthetic. In a way I think I have inherited this prosaic unsophisticated world and I am combining it with the space-age. COLUMN is something in between these zones, a 10-metre inflatable playing with form and shaking the habitualesque Brancusian play on materials. The work explores the intangibility and the romantic nature of the unseen. By using the camouflage I tried to connect with the space and also imitate it. I was thinking of how to create a sense of balance and lightness.

During the four years since I have been in the UK I achieved things I never imagined at the beginning. This year, I have been offered a place to study at the MA Sculpture programmes of the RCA and the Slade. I have graduated with a first class diploma from University Campus Suffolk in 2014. I was ’Student of the Year’ 2012, 2013 & 2014. I built a major public sculpture at Futura Park- Ipswich worth £30K. I have organised SNIP as part of the Aldeburgh Festival 2013, winning £15K funding from Arts Council England. Subsequently I was offered residencies at Caroline Wiseman’s Lookout - Aldeburgh and Kurt Schwitters Merzbarn - Cumbria, Lake District. I have also worked for Outpost Gallery Norwich in 2011. I formerly studied Architecture at University of Architecture and Urbanism ‘Ion Mincu’ in Bucharest for three years 2004-2007.