With images from the Romanian World War I photographer Costică Acsinte, Australian photographer Jane Long celebrated 47 years of diplomatic relations between Australia and Romania. The characters in the series were from Acsinte’s work. Last March the series Dancing With Costică was held in the Romanian Embassy in Canberra, Australia.
The anniversary was an “excellent opportunity to speak about two countries who never fought each other, with little common history but sharing the same European values of democracy, state of law and human rights”, stated Ambassador Bărbulescu.
Acsinte’s black and white photos showed people from almost 100 years ago, staring ahead from their every day lives. Long takes them and adds elements of nature and color to give the photos new life. “I wanted to change the context of the images,” said Long. “Photographic practices at the time meant people rarely smiled in photos but that doesn’t mean they didn’t laugh and love. I wanted to introduce that to the images.”
Images source: Jane Long
