In accordance with the public role it assumes in the community, as the main comprehensive university in the western region of Romania, the Western University of Timișoara is already known through the series of events and cultural productions, through the significant involvement of specialists, experts and notables representatives of the creative and artistic sectors in our faculties and research centres. We believe that these events, which we grouped under the generic "At UVT, Culture is Capital!", represents a substantial contribution through which our university community participates in the cultural profile of the future "European Capital of Culture - Timișoara 2023".

This topic was the focus of the open conference organized on April 16 at UVT under the title "Integration of the cultural resources of the Western University of Timișoara – Horizon 2023", in which the cultural events that UVT proposes to the public and which, together, can form a cultural master-plan of UVT's participation in all the cultural events of 2023, the contribution of the UVT community to the cultural year "Timișoara 2023", were discussed. 

The rector of UVT, university professor Dr. Marilen Gabriel Pirtea, emphasized at the end of the conference:

"The concrete projects from this cultural master plan, proposed and supported by the Western University of Timișoara, are true real bridges, axes of the realization of the functional partnership between the local administration and our university. We propose a program "UVT 2023 for Timișoara 2023".

UVT is a source of talent through its exceptional people of culture, through its artists, through researchers and trainers of cultural life, many of whom are today in the middle of this debate, but it is also present on the cultural scene through many other graduates, names that are resounding for the public, as are the well-known Daniel Vighi, Ileana Pintilie, Radu Pavel Gheo, Brîndușa Armanca, Șerban Foarță, Adrian Bodnaru, Sorina Jecza, Smaranda Vultur, Cornel Ungureanu, Gabriel Malancioiu, Camelia Mingasson, Dorian Branea and Marius Lazurca, and here I have only mentioned a small part of them. The cultural family of UVT can be found in the entire Timișoara community, throughout the country and in the four cardinal points, and the year of Timișoara - European Capital of Culture 2023 - brings us together and motivates us to offer the public a tailored program of events and performances expectations."

Here is a projection of how we will integrate the cultural resources of the UVT through the projects we propose in the future calendar of the program "Timișoara 2023 - European Capital of Culture", debated and appreciated during the open conference on Friday, April 16:

• The cycle of events with guests, "At UVT, Culture is capital!"

As it has been observed, for many years now, even before Timișoara won the title of European Capital of Culture, UVT developed a sustained cultural program, which became even more meaningful in recent years, when great cultural personalities of today's Romania they performed on the stage of the Aula Magna "Ioan Curea", which had become too large. The events of 2020, organized in this framework, included an agenda of topics and a series of national and international guests, relevant to the Timișoara public environment: Horia Roman – Patapievici, Ioan T. Morar, Dorian Branea, Germina Nagât, șa. Hence our current motto: "At UVT, Culture is capital!", under which we intend to expand the cultural program in the period 2021-2023.

• A Cultural Program "UVT 2023" with its own identity

The cultural resources in UVT are multiple. They are manifested in all the fields in which our faculties evolve and form elites:

• Literature and music

• Visual arts and applied arts

• Theology and philosophy

• Sports and physical education

• Urban ecology and environment

In all these areas, UVT is preparing for the development of its own 2023 cultural program, which we will finance from our own budget and which we will insert into the general program of Timisoara. As part of the partnership with the local administration, we are looking forward to getting to know our cultural partners and finally finding a centralizing cultural structure, with which we can have a fruitful dialogue for the realization of the "UVT 2023 Cultural Program".

Some projects have already outlined their specifics and become individualized, among which it is worth noting:

• Annual exhibition with a selection of undergraduate and dissertation theses of the students of the Faculty of Arts and Design
• Interfoto Biennale – international photography exhibition in its seventh edition
• Interdesign Biennale – complementary event with Interfoto, carried out by the same structure, but oriented towards the study directions of design: ambient, product, graphic, jewelry, eco, etc.
• ART AI international event – oriented towards the mix of artificial intelligence tools and human creativity.
• FISART street art festival - organized in partnership with the Enduromania Association, the largest in Romania, takes place in Timișoara and neighboring cities.
• PUBLIC – ART Artistic interventions in public spaces – parks, train station, airport, squares, urban micro-zones – artistic interventions in public space.
• Artist talk – series of lectures open to the public by renowned artists.
• International Triennial of Students from Art Institutes – network of young international talents.
• Art products related to visual culture – editorial plan that facilitates the fixation of culture in memory and archives.

Within this generic, comprehensive program, the networks of partners and cultural operators in which UVT is integrated represent an infrastructure that deserves to be activated and propelled. Only in the network of the Faculty of Arts and Design there are more than 20 international institutions with which partnerships are established, as well as more than 100 well-known graduates of FAD, who over time have become cultural personalities recognized nationally or internationally. The same is true for the Faculty of Music and Theatre, a source of talent and acclaimed artists.

• International cultural cooperation – through the UNITA network and the ELIA project

Until now, UVT has developed a consistent national cultural program, but we also aim to open international cooperation in the cultural field. As it is probably well known, from this year UVT joined a European network of universities from European Romance language countries: France, Spain, Italy and Portugal, a structure called the European network "UNITA - Universitas Montium" with the following partners: Università degli studi di Torino (Italy), Université de Pau et des Pays de l'Adour (France), Université Savoie Mont Blanc (France), Universidad de Zaragoza (Spain) and Universidade Beira Interior (Portugal). The internationalization of our cultural program will be done primarily, but not exclusively, through the UNITA network. The ELIA Project will also facilitate international cultural partnership (ELIA is a globally connected European network that provides a dynamic platform for professional exchange and development in higher artistic education. With over 260 members in 48 countries, ELIA represents over 300.000 of students in all artistic disciplines).

• Timișoara International Literature Festival – central pillar of "TM2023"

UVT will expand its partnership for the organization of FILTM, because the prestigious International Literature Festival in Timișoara, in its XNUMXth edition, led by Robert Șerban and his team of collaborators, deserves to be supported considerably more, with complementary resources and creative ideas, which UVT does not lack.

• Logistics for cultural events – provided free of charge by UVT in the premises and halls of UVT heritage

In 2023, UVT will make its entire logistics available to the Cultural Capital, free of charge, because we are aware and deplore the precarious situation of Timisoara's logistics network. We expect a framework for discussions on this topic with the municipality, a permanent and effective dialogue, with proposals for concrete solutions. We expect, in return, that the local administration will make available a space for the development of our Faculty of Sport and Physical Education. We will also integrate into the city's facilities a new space, a 500-seat performance hall, but also a large, multifunctional exhibition hall, for which there is a project and a budget. The central location of these new spaces, convertible and suitable for many categories of cultural events, offers great opportunities for the TM2023 program.

• Silviu Oravitzan Foundation

Personalities of UVT are currently organizing the establishment of the Silviu Oravitzan Foundation, an associative formula whose first major objective will be the creation, with mixed funds, of a new city museum, dedicated exclusively to the promotion of a large donation from the artist. And in this chapter we will need the decisive involvement of the Timișoara City Hall, which, we must specify, is not about funds.

The open conference "UVT2023 for TM2023" was attended by the rector of UVT, prof. Dr. Marilen Gabriel Pirtea, together with Prof. Univ. Dr. Vasile Popovici and Prof. Univ. Dr. Mircea Mihăieș, but also several representative personalities of the UVT academic community - university professors Marcel Tolcea, Violeta Zonte, Camil Mihăiescu, Loredana Pungă, Irina Macsinga - along with their special guests:

• the writer Adriana Babeți,

• His Excellency, Mr. Ambassador Emil Hurezeanu,

•        the former director of the Vienna Opera, Ioan Holender

• Director of the Timișoara National Theatre, Ada Hausvater,

• Director of the Timișoara Romanian Opera, Christian Rudic,

• plastic artist Silviu Oravitzan,

• Director of the Timiș Culture Directorate, Sorin Predescu,

• the president of the Timișoara International Literature Festival, the writer and journalist Robert Șerban,

•        BCR Regional Retail Director, Anca Flueraș,

• General Manager & VP Operations FLEX, Alexander Klein.

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We invite you to watch the entire debate in video format HERE, but also find events from the "At UVT, Culture is the Capital" series on UVT's social media page.