Moldova bids farewell to Valentina Rusu-Ciobanu

A funeral service was held on Friday for Valentina Rusu-Ciobanu, as flags on public buildings across the country were ordered at half-mast to honor the centenarian plastic artist.

During the ceremony, Culture Minister Sergiu Prodan announced the authorities plan to establish a museum – on 38 Ureche Street in the historic center of Chisinau – in the house where Rusu-Ciobanu lived with her equally famous husband, the late plastic artist Glebus Sainciuc.

“Their home was at the center of this cultural vortex. The entire company of the Luceafărul Theater, when they returned from Moscow, were frequent visitors. They were a remarkable couple. They were able to bring together around them the entire cultural elite of Moldova”, declared Prodan.

Plastic artist Tudor Zbârnea, director of the National Art Museum, said that Rusu-Ciobanu will remain in our hearts and in our consciousness as one of the most important artists in our space. Together with her husband, Glebus Sainciuc, together with Igor Vieru, Mihai Grecu, Eleonora Romănescu, she was a forerunner of the Moldovan visual art. “Valentina Rusu-Ciobanu was, I think, the last of the artists, of the great people of culture coming from the interwar period, people who have a completely different background than us. A different set of values, both spiritual and cultural, but also moral”, added the artist.

Dumitru Bolboceanu, president of the Moldovan Union of Fine Artists, said: “Valentina Rusu-Ciobanu was the most talented and celebrated artist in Moldova”.

Valentina Rusu-Ciobanu was born on 28 October 1920 in Chisinau and studied in Iasi. Over the years she received multiple distinctions, including the National Award for Arts, the honorary title of People’s Artist and the Order of the Republic, Moldova’s highest civilian honor. She died this past Monday, just days after her 101st birthday.