Radu Juster

A native of Bucharest, Romania, Radu Juster studied architecture at the École Spéciale d' Architecture in Paris, before settling in Montreal in 1976. In the 80s, he initiated and led a research and development project in appropriate construction technology in Haiti, funded by the Canadian Save the Children Foundation. For the past 26 years, Radu Juster practiced architecture at McGill University – first as head of the internal design office, lately in the Campus Planning Office - while indulging his love of photography, and writing and directing short fiction and documentary films. Founder and director of Amedem Media, a Montreal company film production and multimedia educational material, his films have been shown in many festivals internationally and in Canada. His photographs found their home in private collections, have been published and have won awards. His photographic quest is part of the construction of a body of work in which human experience is dominant. The imagination of this artist is rooted in the narrative and it gives us fragments of human lives that oscillate between fantasy and allegory. Nothing is left to chance in the composition of his work – both film and photography. Attention to detail, neat, meticulous framing and carefully staged lighting give the work a dramatic, dreamlike power. The element of surprise is a recurring element in the work of Radu Juster. Between foreign places, unreal characters and timeless lights, the artist takes us to the mystical universe, fun, contemporary and majestic. Ruins of Buddhist temples, incandescent lights of Berlin, Tokyo or Istanbul, or in his notoriously creative studio work – this artist’s eye captures the incandescent beauty and wonder of the human condition.