Lena Constante
Lena Constante | |
---|---|
Born | |
Died | November 2005 | (aged 96)
Nationality | Romanian |
Education | Romanian Art Academy |
Occupation(s) | Artist, essayist, memoirist |
Spouse | Harry Brauner |
Lena Constante (June 18, 1909 – November 2005) was a
Constante was the wife of the musicologist Harry Brauner, and the sister-in-law of the painter Victor Brauner.
Biography
Born in Bucharest, she was the daughter of an Aromanian journalist (Constantin Constante, who had immigrated from Macedonia) and his Romanian wife.[1] The Constante family left the city during the World War I German occupation, and Lena spent much of her childhood in Iași, Kherson, Odessa, London, and Paris.[2]
Returning at the end of the conflict, she studied Painting at the Romanian Art Academy in Bucharest, and established friendships with leading intellectuals of her time, including Brauner, Mircea Vulcănescu, Petru Comarnescu, Henri H. Stahl, Mihail Sebastian, and Paul Sterian.[3] During the period, she became sympathetic to left-wing politics[4] and joined the sociological project initiated by Dimitrie Gusti, aiding in the creation of comprehensive monographs on traditional Romanian society;[5] her visits to various villages acquainted her with traditional folk art, especially religious icons, which she later used as inspiration in her work.[5]
Constante first exhibited her art in 1934, and had personal shows in 1935, and 1946; her last exhibit before being arrested occurred in Ankara, Turkey (1947).[6]
After 1945, she was employed as a stage designer by the newly founded Țăndărică Theater, where she met Elena Pătrășcanu, Lucrețiu's wife.[7] In early 1946, when Pătrăşcanu, who was Romania's Minister of Justice, decided to go against the will of his party and intervened in the standoff between King Michael I and the Petru Groza executive (greva regală – "the royal strike"), she mediated between him and two well-known anti-communist figures Victor Rădulescu-Pogoneanu and Grigore Niculescu-Buzești, in an attempt to ensure their support for a political compromise.[8]
Together with her friend Brauner, as well as Remus Koffler, Belu Zilber, Petre Pandrea, Herant Torosian, Ioan Mocsony-Stârcea , the engineer Emil Calmanovici, Alexandru Ștefănescu, and others, she was implicated in Pătrășcanu's 1954 trial, being sentenced to twelve years in prison.[9] The person who took initiative in bringing her to trial was Securitate deputy chief Alexandru Nicolschi.[10]
During repeated interrogations by the Securitate, Constante tried to fend off false accusations of "Titoism" and "treason", but, the victim of constant beatings and torture[11] (much of her hair was torn from the roots),[10] and confronted with Zilber's testimony — which implicated her —, she eventually gave in and admitted to the charges.[12]
Throughout the rest of her life, she maintained a highly critical view of Zilber, and expressed her admiration for Pătrășcanu, who had for long resisted pressures and had been executed in the end.[4] As she stated in 2004,
"I did not know [Lucrețiu Pătrășcanu] too well. It was not [because of] him that I went to jail. Neither was it [because of] Mrs. Elena [Pătrășcanu]. His friend, Belu Zilber, made us go to jail, me and my husband. Zilber was never pleased with all the things he kept inventing in his confessions and he would concoct some stuff that aimed to please the interrogators. To please [Gheorghiu-]Dej."[13]
For much of her time in prison, Constante was kept in virtually complete solitude, a special regime which she later attributed to her earlier refusal to confess.
Constante exhibited her works on two other occasions (in 1970 and 1971, both centered on tapestry and collage art).[16]
In 1990, after the
In 1997, Constante starred as herself in Nebunia Capetelor, a film by Thomas Ciulei based on The Silent Escape;[19] Ciulei had originally intended to cast Maia Morgenstern as Constante, but ultimately decided to pay a special tribute to the book's theme ("I wanted to force the spectator to build himself an imaginary space, as Lena Constante had done when she was in her cell").[20]
Notes
- ^ a b Constante, in Spalas
- ^ Constante, in Spalas; Eldridge Miller, p.70; Humanitas biography
- ^ Humanitas biography; Tismăneanu, "Memorie..."
- ^ a b c Tismăneanu, "Memorie..."
- ^ a b Eldridge Miller, p.70; "Evocare..."; Humanitas biography
- ^ a b c Humanitas biography
- ^ Constante, in Lăcustă; "Evocare..."; Humanitas biography
- ^ Betea
- ^ Frunză, p.401, 409; Golpenția; Humanitas biography; Tismăneanu, Stalinism..., p.293
- ^ a b Golpenția
- ^ Cesereanu; Golpenția
- ^ Tismăneanu, "Memorie...", Stalinism..., p.294
- ^ Lăcustă
- ^ Cesereanu
- ^ Eldridge Miller, p.70; Humanitas biography
- ^ "Evocare..."; Humanitas biography
- ^ "Evocare..."
- ^ LiterNet
- ^ Eldridge Miller, p.70; LiterNet; Spalas
- ^ Ciulei, on LiterNet
References
- (in Romanian) Biography at the Humanitassite
- (in Romanian) "Evocare Lena Constante: expoziție și album", in Ziua, November 30, 2005[dead link]
- (in Romanian) "Un film despre Lena Constante: Nebunia capetelor, de Thomas Ciulei, la ICR" ("A Film about Lena Constante: Nebunia Capetelor, by Thomas Ciulei"), LiterNet press release
- (in Romanian) Lavinia Betea, "Ambiția de a intra în istorie" ("The Determination to Enter History"), in Magazin Istoric
- (in Romanian) Ruxandra Cesereanu, "Reprezentanții represiunii: anchetatorul rafinat, torționarul sadic și bufonul balcanizat" ("The Representatives of Repression: The Refined Inquirer, the Sadistic Torturer and the Balkanized Buffoon"), at Memoria.ro[dead link]
- Jane Eldridge Miller, Who's Who in Contemporary Women's Writing, ISBN 0-415-15980-6
- Victor Frunză, Istoria stalinismului în România ("The History of Stalinism in Romania"), Humanitas, Bucharest, 1990
- (in Romanian) Sanda Golpenția , "Introducere la Ultima carte de Anton Golpenția (Anchetatorii)" ("Introduction to Anton Golpenția's Ultima carte (The Inquisitors)"), at Memoria.ro[dead link]
- (in Romanian) Ioan Lăcustă "În București, acum 50 de ani" ("In Bucharest, 50 Years Ago"), interview with Lena Constante, in Magazin Istoric, April 2004
- (in Romanian) Marina Spalas, "«Au crezut că vom accepta minciunile din scenariul lui Zilber...»" ("«They Thought We Would Accept the Lies in Zilber's Scenario...»"), interview with Lena Constante at Vlachophiles.net
- Vladimir Tismăneanu,
- (in Romanian) "Memorie și supraviețuire" ("Memory and Survival"), in Cotidianul, December 2, 2005
- Stalinism for All Seasons: A Political History of Romanian Communism, ISBN 0-520-23747-1