I am Ioana Ciolea, a visual artist born in Alba Iulia and based in Reșița. I graduated from UNArte Bucharest, specializing in Photo-Video, and have been working with analog film for nearly 20 years. In my artistic practice, I combine photography with work on archives — personal or collective — and with artisanal techniques such as stained glass. Since 2018, I have been collaborating with The Amateur Filmmaker’s Museum, and I am currently working with the Banatul Montan Community Foundation. My work engages with memory, fragility, and the ways in which we preserve, repair, and reinterpret what is often overlooked.
For me, violence against women is not an abstract theme — I have gone through direct forms of abuse, both physical and emotional, and I still carry their traces within me. For a long time, I kept silent, because every time I spoke — about what happened to me or about things I found unacceptable — I was immediately rebuked: I was “commenting,” “looking for trouble,” “crazy.” These reactions hurt, but above all, they exhaust. I have always refused to submit to invisible rules, yet I am constantly penalized for it.
As an artist, I have encountered other kinds of violence — quieter, but still aggressive. Mansplaining at every step, my work being overlooked, validation offered much more easily to the men around me. In glass, in photography, in any context, it seems I always have to prove something extra, just because I am a woman.
I no longer want to justify myself for speaking the truth. I want such experiences to be acknowledged, and for all of us to question why women who refuse to conform are immediately seen as a problem.
This black-and-white photograph was made on film, developed and scanned by me. I chose it because I have made a habit of signing myself, like a trademark, with this gesture of waving, which I keep repeating.
