The British have always had an ambivalent relationship with their flag. Since its iconic high-point in 1966, when the red, white and blue of the Union Jack found its way onto everything from mini cars to mini-dresses, this one-time symbol of Swinging London has had serious image problems. The oil-shocks and economic crises of the mid-70's not only served as a rude awakening for the dreamy optimism of the 1960s generation, but also heralded a new, more sinister use of the flag - from which it never really recovered. Thanks to the far-right movements that the instability of the 70s gave birth to, the British flag was for the best part of my own youth associated with a barely-veiled racism. "There aint no black in the Union Jack" - so went the well-known schoolyard rhyme of the time. This symbol of Britishness came to stand simply for 'whiteness' and outright opposition to immigration from the dangerous lands that lie beyond the British Isles.
Since then we've seen successive attempts to re-claim the flag, with 1998 being a particular key year. Only six years after The Smiths' front-man Morrissey had earned himself a reputation as a racist for wrapping himself in the Union Jack, the symbol was suddenly everywhere. Liam Gallagher and Patsy Kensit posed under a Union Jack duvet on the cover of Vanity Fair, while the Spice Girls wore the symbol on their knickers. 'Cool Britannia' and the youthful optimism of Britpop went some way to changing the old connotations - though despite all this, the flag remains an ideologically loaded symbol.
It's an excess of Romanian tricolour flags that the film buffs currently descending upon the city of Cluj for the Transylvania International Film Festival will have been greeted by upon arrival this week. It's been a bumper year for Romanian film, with Catalin Mitulescu taking the short film Palme d'Or at Cannes for "Trafic", and Cristi Puiu's 'Cigarettes and Coffee' receiving the Golden Bear award for short film in Berlin. In confirmation of this, the third Transylvania International Film Festival is bigger and better than ever, featuring more than 90 movies from over 30 countries, open-air screening, seminars and discussion groups.
The festival itself not only invites well over 100 foreign guests to the city, but attracts large numbers of celluloid-hungry tourists to Cluj. The city is thus placed in a particularly powerful role as cultural ambassador for the rest of Romania. First time visitors might find the red, yellow and blue park benches, rubbish bins, posts and railings that dominate the city centre just plain odd. However, in a city whose ethnic Hungarian residents make up more than 20% of the total population they arguably serve a more worrying function.
"I personally find this use of the national flag not only rather dangerous, but also ridiculous," explained Cosmin Costinas, an art critic and member of the Romanian 'Mindbomb' movement. If you've taken a closer look at the walls of Bucharest, Cluj, Iasi, Timisoara or Sibiu over the past few months then you might already be familiar with the work of the Mindbomb group. In an effort to reclaim public spaces for the public, Mindbombers have been sticking-up posters with a strong political and social message across these and other Romanian towns and cities.
"The first time Mindbomb took place was 2002," Cosmin explains. "The posters tackled a number of issues, from adoptions to homelessness. The 2004 campaign was more focused, and we produced a series of posters on the theme of corruption - the role that we as individuals play in sustaining the problem." Designs were submitted by members of the public, with 11 being chosen and fly-posted across the country.
However, for their next action the group plans to tackle what they see as the requisitioning of the Romanian flag in Cluj by nationalist mayor Gheorghe Funar, a member of Vadim Tudor's PRM (Greater Romania Party). "The plan is to re-paint some of Cluj's benches in the European flag, doing them in blue with yellow stars stencilled on top. The idea behind it plays on the empty and delirious use of the Romanian national symbols, and the similarity with the way in which the European flag is used," Cosmin explained. "Just as the flag has been drained of its meaning, EU accession has also become an issue which is perceived in an uncritical and over-enthusiastic way by almost the whole of Romanian society, and by all major political parties. That is why the re-painting is not a political gesture - it refers to a general issue concerning an entire society, an issue being approached quite similarly by all political groups."
"With the elections looming, it seems like people have come to realise that using the Romanian flag in this manner is a sensitive issue," he continued. "We've recently seen some benches, and I think all of the bins, repainted in plain colours."
As the British experience shows, allowing the flag to be used to further dubiously nationalistic ends can have unexpectedly long lasting consequences. The Union Jack's tainted history aside, there are still good reasons to be sceptical of those who rally round the flag. No matter how many Indian restaurants proudly fly the flag during England football matches - no matter how all-encompassing we make its symbolism - a flag is still a symbol which separates 'us' from 'them'. It's very difficult to celebrate our nationality without at the same time marking out those who don't happen to have the good fortune to share in this rather arbitrary allegiance. Here's hoping that the Cluj authorities get wind of Mindbomb's plans and decide to lend a helping hand with the re-decorating job.
