Andrei Pleşu is professor of art history, philosophy and religion at the University of Bucharest. Beginning his career at the Institute of Art History at the Romanian Academy and then teaching in the Art Department at the University of Bucharest, Pleşu was barred from teaching and publishing in the early 1980s for his political standings. After the Romanian Revolution of 1989 he was one of the founders of the "New Europe College,” and of the cultural magazine Dilema. Pleşu was Romania's Minister of Culture from 1990 to 1991, Foreign Minister from 1997 to 1999, and presidential counselor for external affairs from 2004 to 2005. He is a member of the World Academy of Art and Science and the Academie Internationale de Philosophie de l'Art in Geneva.