Paul Neagu
Paul Neagu ( born February 22, 1938 in Bucharest, † June 16, 2004 in London) was a British- Romanian artist, sculptor, painter and performance artist.
Life
Paul Neagu was the second son of six children of the cobbler Tudor Neagu and his wife Rosalie, and grew up in Timişoara. He studied philology, philosophy, and engineering sciences. From 1959 to 1965 he studied at the National University of Arts Bucharest, Institute of Plastic Arts " Nicolae Grigorescu ". Prior to his artistic career, he worked as an electrician and a draftsman. His 1965 marriage in Sibyla Orancea was dissolved in 1967 childless.
As the Romanian government temporarily relaxed its minorities and cultural policy, he traveled in 1969 on the invitation of artist Richard Demarco to London, where he lived and worked ever since. Neagu made together with the at that time still emerging artists Joseph Beuys and Tadeusz Kantor contribute to DeMarco program at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
In London, he lectured on the fine arts at the Hornsey College of Art, the Slade School of Fine Art, and at the Chelsea College of Art and Design. In 1976 he was appointed Associate Professor at the Royal College of Art. Among his students, among others, Antony Gormley, Anish Kapoor, Tony Cragg, Langlands & Bell, and Rachel Whiteread were.
Neagu received British citizenship in 1977, and 1991-1992 his Romanian citizenship back. In addition to teaching, Paul Neagu pursued his own career as an artist. His strong coffee and tobacco consumption later caused him health problems. 1989 gave him his sister a kidney for a transplant. In 2003 he suffered a stroke from which he zurückbehielt a speech impediment.
After Neagus death, the London gallery Flowers East works sold from his estate.
Artistic creation
Neagus background as a draftsman was also evident in his drawings and sculptures. His sculptures convey the idea of movement through abstract form. His drawings, paintings, sculptures and performances are closely linked. Typical of his works are star shapes and other geometric shapes, often of stainless steel, whose surface structure captures the light and breaks. Invite the participation of the viewer and require its concentration; they need time and space to make their way into the consciousness to find.
Shoemaker strips, a triangular piece of wood or metal in foot shape, manufactured or repaired on the shoes, was in the works Neagus recurrent trademarks, which he called hyphae. For the religious Neagu deep respect for the " sacred geometry " had the hyphae symbolizes the formal trinity of the triangle, the square and the circle. He saw in the hyphae the source of a universal energy to rule the human and thus imaginative life.
Neagus works are in numerous public collections, including the United Kingdom, the British Museum, the Tate Gallery, the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh. Further works are in collections of the Fund Departmental d'art contemporain in Bobigny, Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane, the Musee Cantonal de Beaux Arts in Lausanne, the Muzeul Naţional de Arta al României in Bucharest, as well as the Philadelphia Museum of Art
Two of his works are available since 1990 as a public sculptures in his home country; Crucea Mileniului at Piata Charles de Gaulle in Bucharest, as well as Crucificarea ( German Crucifixion ) at Piata Victoriei in Timişoara. [Note 1]
Neagu presented his work worldwide and received numerous awards, including the 1996 Blue Ribbon Medal ( Congo Hosyo ) of the Japanese government and the Leverhulme Trust Research Award in 1997.