PANOPTIKUM or the Memory of Objects: a performance by director Martina Novakova

⚡ In partnership with Racho Stoyanov Drama Theatre

🎫 Tickets: at the box office of Racho Stoyanov Drama Theatre or online here

On September 23 at 18:00, the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center in Gabrovo invites you on a theatrical journey through the house of L. and the stories of unusual objects that preserve her memories, with the original performance PANOPTIKUM* by Martina Novakova.

Behind every corner of this house-museum lurks something unexpected: conflicting voices from the past; the gaze of a painted all-seeing eye; a silent telephone bought at a flea market in Madrid; a half-forgotten melody; the workers of a house-clearing company.

Memory becomes a dangerous territory, where the fate of objects depends on the attention of the audience. Each viewer must choose their own place within the space and the story they wish to follow. The experience combines several disciplines: verbatim theatre, original live music, and installation art. A central source of inspiration for the performance is the work of Christo and Jeanne-Claude.

PANOPTIKUM is a story about the fear of losing memory, about the material world and the objects we choose to surround ourselves with, the value we attribute to them, and their influence on our relationships.

* panoptikum (noun, singular) — a museum where rare and valuable objects or wax figures are displayed.

❕ Duration: 80 minutes, during which the audience moves freely through the space. Please inform the organizers in advance if you require a seated place.

PANOPTIKUM is an original performance by Martina Novakova, adapted to various spaces – houses, museums, underground sites – and constantly evolving. It was created within the Master’s program in Theatre Arts at Carlos III University of Madrid, under the direction of Juan Mayorga. The premiere took place in June 2018 at Auditorio de Leganés in Madrid. In 2020, it was selected by EURODRAM Bulgaria and presented within the “ProText 10” festival at Goethe-Institut, Sofia. Its Bulgarian premiere was realized with the financial support of the National Culture Fund, Debuts program (2021), and took place in February 2024 at RCAC Toplocentrala.

The event in Gabrovo is carried out with the financial support of the National Culture Fund, Distribution program 2024, and in partnership with the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center – Gabrovo and Racho Stoyanov Drama Theatre – Gabrovo.

RadLab Studio and the largest festival for analog and experimental photography in Bulgaria

For the second year in a row, RadLab Studio is hosting an event dedicated to analog and experimental photography. De Vita Solitaria / On the Solitary Life is an independent festival – though the word hardly captures its essence – a three-day gathering of artists, enthusiasts, collectors, and researchers of photographic processes who are connected to, or in search of, a relationship with analog photography.

The theme of the 2025 edition is “Solitude” – not as alienation, but as a space for observation, inner dialogue, and conscious encounters with oneself. The festival explores solitude as a potential for creative imagination, while also building a bridge back to the time before social networks, when every image was an act of discovery – found through effort, patience, and silence.

The program of De Vita Solitaria unfolds through six workshops, three exhibitions, four discussions, interventions in public space, and challenges to our own understanding of photography. Events move between the darkroom and the street, between the intimate and the noisy. The atmosphere is participatory and encourages dialogue, combining personal experiences with the collective energy of sharing.

The events will take place at two locations in Gabrovo:

• RadLab Studio (9Zh Shipka St.)
• RadLab Residency @ Christo & Jeanne-Claude Center (72 Bryanska St. – former Textile High School)

Participation is free of charge. You don’t need to own a Mamiya RB67 or to have read Camera Lucida in French – all that’s required is to register in advance, so that materials and logistics can be prepared.

De Vita Solitaria – RadLab Community Gathering 2025 will be held from 20 to 22 September 2025 in Gabrovo. Full details of the program can be found here.

About RadLab Studio

RadLab Studio is a space for analog and alternative photography where like-minded people can learn, experiment, and inspire one another. The team believes that analog photography and noble photographic processes should be accessible to everyone. Its mission is to foster inclusion by providing open access to the studio, conducting research, and preserving and sharing both knowledge and practical skills.

RadLab believes the most meaningful processes happen together – and invites anyone who shares this vision to become part of its community.

Childhood Years: Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center presents an exhibition at the Bulgarian Cultural Institute in Paris

On September 19, the exhibition “Childhood Years” by the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center for Contemporary Art – Gabrovo will open at the gallery of the Bulgarian Cultural Institute in Paris. The occasion is twofold – 90 years since the birth of Christo Javacheff and 30 years since the emblematic Pont Neuf project, which left a lasting mark on the artistic history of Paris.

Childhood Years explores childhood as the first stage of imagination – a time when play and freedom outline the contours of future creative thought. The exhibition brings together rare photographs and documentary materials from Christo’s early years in Bulgaria with works by a new generation of contemporary artists currently working at the Center in Gabrovo. In this way, the exhibition creates a bridge between Christo’s personal history and the collective energy of young artists, between the memory of beginnings and the vision for the future.

Seven of them – Anton Ivanov, Gergana Lazarova-Runkel, Ivelin Penchev, Konstantin Zlatev, Nevena Ekimova, Pavel Tsarov, and Radoil Serafimov – will present their works in the French capital for the first time.

A special section is dedicated to Christo’s childhood – his family, schools and factories, favorite games, and first steps in art. These early experiences would later crystallize into the iconic elements of his work with Jeanne-Claude – fabrics, ropes, barrels.

Opened in 2023, the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center is located in the building of the former Textile High School in Gabrovo. It functions as an artist residency and space for contemporary art, inspired by the legacy of Christo and Jeanne-Claude. Though still in development, the Center already attracts young creators from different countries and is steadily establishing itself as a place for experimentation, dialogue, and new artistic horizons.

The exhibition “Childhood Years” is organized by the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center – Gabrovo and the Bulgarian Cultural Institute in Paris, with the support of the Museum of Humor and Satire, the Municipality of Gabrovo, and the America for Bulgaria Foundation.

Radoil Serafimov: drawing has never been a decision so much as an extension of self.

For Radoil Serafimov, drawing has never been a decision so much as an extension of self. From early childhood, it existed as a natural motion – quiet, constant, and unquestioned. There was never a dramatic pivot toward art, no sudden realization. It was always there, simply unfolding along with him.

He studied painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Veliko Tarnovo, and after graduating, returned to his hometown of Gabrovo. The first couple of years back were marked by uncertainty: a stretch of time defined more by absence than direction. No income, no formal work, no studio. To sustain himself, he began creating paintings with commercial potential. Even in that space, he remained attentive to the integrity of the image, steering away from decorative clichés or cheap sentiment, committed instead to maintaining a sense of internal coherence and aesthetic seriousness.

Eventually, with support from his family, he secured a small attic space that became his first proper studio. In just a few months, he produced around twenty new paintings and began submitting them to competitions and open calls – many of which, at the time, still offered significant opportunities for young artists. Most led to silence. His early efforts were regularly overlooked, especially in the more centralized and saturated circles in Sofia.

But in 2014, something shifted. Though his application for the BAZA Award wasn’t selected, one of its jurors, curator Maria Vassileva, noticed his portfolio. Through the Stoyan Kambarev Foundation, she was then initiating a new award specifically for young painters. Serafimov received the 2014 prize, and with it came an opening – more invitations, more visibility, more recognition. What followed wasn’t a breakthrough in the cinematic sense, but rather a slow, steady unfolding of possibility.

For the next nine years, Serafimov balanced his painting practice with full-time work as a scenography technician in the local Gabrovo theater. It offered financial stability, but more importantly, it allowed him to maintain a consistent presence in the studio. Every free moment, before rehearsals, between productions, after hours, he returned to his canvases.

Over time, his work has evolved in form, palette, and tone, but its core has remained anchored in a particular way of looking: careful, considered, open to ambiguity. Some images are born from direct observation, others from fleeting impressions or visual memory. The subject matter ranges widely – figures, landscapes, fragments of architecture, imagined spaces – but what holds it together is a persistent desire to touch on something beyond the visible.

He rarely begins with a defined message or conceptual frame. Sometimes a painting arrives with urgency, completed in a day, responding to a specific sensation or internal spark. Other times, the process unfolds more slowly in days of looking, doubting, reworking. His more recent practice favors this latter rhythm, marked by intervals of reflection, hesitation, and quiet resistance. What compels him most are forms that resist simple interpretation – shapes or images that contain multiple readings, that suggest rather than state. The symbolic emerges not through theory, but through texture and tone. “I’m drawn to the spaces in an object where something else is hiding,” he says. “Something layered, something not immediately legible.”

When Serafimov was offered a studio at the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center in Gabrovo, his response was cautious. He had grown attached to his previous workspace, and relocating meant disrupting a familiar rhythm. It took months before he fully moved in – months in which the studio existed more as a potential than a place of work. Eventually, that shifted. The space settled around him. He began painting there consistently, finding his own pace within the new architecture. Today, he describes his studio at the Center as a functional, focused environment, less romantic than grounded, less about inspiration than about permission.

The building itself, once a textile school and now in transformation, holds a certain ambient charge. While Serafimov doesn’t directly use found objects or industrial remnants in his work, he responds to their quiet presence. To him, they are not resources to be repurposed but witnesses to time: objects that carry history without needing to explain it.

Though his practice is deeply individual, Serafimov recognizes the subtle value of proximity to others. The artists at the Center each work in distinct mediums, with different temperaments and trajectories, but over time, an organic form of community has begun to take shape – not one based on collaboration, but on presence, on shared effort, on parallel lives unfolding under the same roof. It is not a collective in the conventional sense. There are no joint projects or formal frameworks for exchange. But the slow accumulation of conversations, the gentle weaving of familiarity, has created a quiet current between the studios, one that Serafimov finds grounding, even if he remains mostly inward in his focus.

When asked about the connection between his practice and the Center’s namesakes, Serafimov is reflective but firm. He admires the work of Christo and Jeanne-Claude, their dedication, the magnitude of their vision, their insistence on impermanence. He sees value in the ephemerality they pursued, in the idea that an artwork can be both monumental and momentary. But his own work speaks in another register. It unfolds slowly, endures materially, resists spectacle. He does not seek to mirror their legacy, nor does he feel obliged to. What resonates is their conviction – their unyielding commitment to making, regardless of reception or reward.

In a cultural moment where painting is often asked to justify itself, where trends favor interdisciplinarity, political urgency, or social engagement, Serafimov continues to trust the quiet labor of the image. He is not indifferent to the world, but believes that complexity can live within the frame, within the act of looking, within the relationship between pigment and surface. Not every day in the studio results in a painting. Some are filled with silence, with music playing softly in the background, with notes, books, sketches, and pauses. Others begin with no plan at all: a brushstroke, a line, a movement that slowly unfolds into something more.

There is no fixed concept or unifying thesis behind his work. He avoids declarations. His approach is intuitive, exploratory, porous. If there is a theme, it lies in the attention he gives to things – his commitment to seeing, to lingering, to allowing meaning to arrive without force. As for the future of his place in the Center, he remains open. If the atmosphere shifts too far from the conditions that allow his practice to thrive, if the rhythms change, if the demands overtake the quiet, he may choose to move on. For now, though, he is here. And in this moment, that is enough.

“A Frame from the Textile” – A Theatrical Walk Through the Memory of a School

Alongside its artistic residency, the Metamorphosis of Workwear project also engages deeply with the local community in Gabrovo through the collection of oral histories. These stories – shared by individuals connected to the region’s industrial past – have been transformed into a work of art. Over the past month, the project team conducted a series of interviews that revived the memories of people whose lives were closely tied to the former Textile High School – now the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center.

In partnership with playwright and director Martina Novakova*, the collected stories were adapted into a script for a verbatim theatre performance – a form of “walking theatre” that took place on May 2 and 3 at the Center. Audiences were invited into the building, guided by the authentic voices of former students, teachers, local officials, neighbors, and tour guides – embodied by actresses from Gabrovo’s Racho Stoyanov Drama Theatre: Nadezhda Petkova, Magdalena Slavcheva, and Radostina Angelova. 

These performers became vessels for transforming these real-life testimonies into a moving, immersive experience, allowing the local community to reconnect with and reimagine its past through a contemporary lens. The audience was not merely passive – they were drawn into the architecture itself, discovering the building as a living heritage site from the peak of Gabrovo’s textile era. Memories of former students, teachers, and workers came alive before their eyes – familiar and deeply resonant.

With this work, the team set out to build a collective portrait of what the Textile School once was, and to inspire new visions for its future role – as the Regional Center for Contemporary Art Christo and Jeanne-Claude.

“A Frame from the Textile” is part of Metamorphosis of Workwear – a project funded by the Creative Europe programme. It brings together six cities with rich industrial histories – Chemnitz, Gabrovo, Łódź, Manchester, Mulhouse, and Tampere – around the idea of reimagining workwear through the lens of contemporary labor, design, and local memory. Gabrovo Municipality is the official project partner, and the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center is leading its local implementation.

Martina Novakova (Sofia, 1993) is a playwright, director, and educator whose work moves across borders – both geographic and emotional. She holds a degree in Theatre from New York University (2023), where she studied on a Fulbright and Tuk-Tam scholarship, as well as a BA in Theatre from Carlos III University in Madrid, which she completed with distinction. Among her mentors are renowned artists such as Anna Deavere Smith, André Lepecki, and Joe Salvatore.

Martina is the co-founder of Panoptikum Association, through which she develops projects in Bulgaria, Spain, France, and New York, blending documentary verbatim theatre, site-specific performance, and audio theatre. Her work is driven by themes such as memory, migration, war, and community engagement. Selected projects include the audio performance The Daughter of the Frame Maker (National Gallery Kvadrat 500), the documentary show Once You’ve Crossed the Ocean (toured in 11 cities across the US and Spain), the award-winning play A Lesson in Loneliness (First Prize, NBU, 2021), and The Wrapped Audioguide, created for the Sofia City Art Gallery. In 2020, her play Panoptikum was selected by EURODRAM and later realized with support from the National Culture Fund of Bulgaria.

Gergana Lazarova-Runkel isn’t one for simple categories.

Gergana Lazarova-Runkel isn’t one for simple categories. In her atelier at the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center, she is reshaping her role as an artist, blurring the line between stage and textile art, with a mix of ambition and grounded humility. Originally trained as a scenographer, Gergana has developed her craft around the visual and emotional impact of live storytelling. With a Bachelor’s in Scenography and a Master’s in Digital Arts, her work has crossed over from traditional theater into digital projection, staging productions like Arabian Night at Sfumato Theater Workshop and Under the Yoke – 1894 at Gabrovo Drama Theater. Yet in her stay at the Center, she’s finding herself pulled toward something closer to home – literally and figuratively: textile art.

Drawn to tufting, Gergana describes the process of working with fabric as “grounding,” a way to reconnect with the physicality of her craft and the history embedded in the walls of the former textile school. She speaks about this new direction as if it’s both a rebellion against, and a continuation of, her theatrical roots. “Working with textile offers a calm presence,” she says. The result is something intimate and tactile, a deliberate shift away from the monumental visuals of her scenographic work.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s influence is here in spirit, if not in form. Gergana admires their fearless approach, their way of transforming the public space with such bold gestures. “What they accomplished was incredibly brave,” she says, a sentiment she holds close even as her own work stays more introspective. Yet, the weight of self-doubt lingers. “I’m still caught up in how my work will be seen,” she admits, a vulnerable edge that keeps her tied to the present and its messiness, rather than soaring to monumental heights.

Life at the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center has been a journey of discovery, offering both freedom and moments of introspection. While the community is vibrant in bursts, the shared direction among artists feels like an evolving work in progress. “There’s room to grow here,” Gergana reflects, her words carrying a tone of optimism rather than critique. For her, genuine collaboration feels tantalizingly close, and the potential is undeniable. Despite the challenges, she believes the Center provides a unique and supportive environment for artists to explore and thrive.

Gergana Lazarova-Runkel’s work isn’t about polish or presentation. It’s about discovery, about rooting through the layers of fabric and memory, and piecing together something that feels honest and raw. Her art asks questions instead of delivering easy answers. Blending her theater experience with this newfound textile practice, Gergana is crafting something both beautiful and uneasy, the kind of art that’s grounded not only in skill but in the willingness to show what lies beneath. It’s a reflection of an artist finding her way, step by vulnerable step, in a world where honesty often takes a back seat to spectacle.

⚡️Find Gergana’s work on: https://www.behance.net/gingergery

For an intertwined artistic community: hosting Ivelina Ivanova (BrumBur)

The Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center, following the artistic duo’s inspiring legacy of creation through vast public engagement, aims to build an intertwined artistic community to foster within it’s premises, turning this primarily tribute space into a dynamic, living platform for contemporary art production. The center currently hosts 7 artists, each connected by heart or practice with the values and work ethic of Christo and Jeanne-Claude, exploring creative possibilities and the resources of the former Textile Technical School of Gabrovo.

Ivelina Ivanova ’s path into the world of embroidery is anything but conventional, though it is deeply rooted in the craftsmanship of her family. Describing herself as a “craftswoman,” she brings an individual approach to the craft, blending tradition with contemporary aesthetics. Her journey began long before her formal training at the Textile Technical School, which she completed in 2001. Growing up in a household where her parents ran a small embroidery business, Iva was immersed in the depths of her craft from an early age. Her mother, a trained embroiderer, guided her through the art of handcrafting with a sewing machine, an essential tool she still uses today. “I am self-taught in many ways,” Iva reflects, yet her work is always intentional, deeply personal, and rich in history.

The transformation from a family-run business to Iva’s solo enterprise was not without challenges. After the sudden loss of her father during her university years, Iva and her mother faced financial and administrative struggles that ultimately led to the closure of their family business. However, the seeds of creativity were already planted. After raising her two children, Iva’s desire to return to her roots in embroidery grew stronger. In 2017, she registered as a freelance designer, and her creative practice began to take shape.

Iva’s work today is a reflection of her dual commitment to preserving traditional techniques while questioning the consumption-driven demands of modern fashion. Her embroidery is deeply connected to the idea of reusing and recycling materials, contributing to a slower, more mindful approach to creation. She explains, “Every material I work with—be it fabric or denim—is an opportunity to give something old a new life.” Her platform, which she refers to as “BrumBur” (a name inspired by the sound of the sewing machine and sometimes the one in her head), is a space where discarded materials are transformed into heartfelt, handcrafted products, including accessories, personalised items, clothes and bags.

Iva’s journey is a testament to the power of art in reinterpreting the past while creating something timeless. Through her work, she continues to honor the legacy of craft while embracing the possibilities of contemporary practice. At her atelier in the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Center, she finds not only a space for creative experimentation but also a community that supports and encourages the evolution of her work. As Iva looks toward the future, she sees her practice continuing to evolve, with a commitment to producing work that speaks to the importance of sustainability and the preservation of craft in an increasingly disposable world.

Through embroidery, Iva reimagines the possibilities of forgotten textiles, turning them into objects that are both beautiful and meaningful—offering new life to materials that might otherwise be discarded. Her story is a reminder that art is not just about creating for the sake of creation, but about transforming what already exists into something new and full of purpose.