CRITICAL REVIEW


         Sculptor. He made himself known in the late ‘80s through works under the sign of an imprecise archaic reference, in a style full of strength and drama, of a refined primitivism, able to sustain a dense semantic programme. The availability for symbolic themes, for the dramatic mystery, but not for fantastic or oneiric, led him to the 10th century debut, with the controversies and conceptual arguments of the transition, to the mysterious absolution of the sacred, and a biographic incident opened his path toward the severe, demanding, with an Old Testament touch type of Christianity. Dedicated to this programme of religious ideology, he established his imagological repertoire in the dendrological and animal-like universe for the symbolical representations with a great concentration of the significant field. The operability of creating metaphors is based on a system of distortions, of dynamic deformities of the major signs, just like the interchangeable support between the tree and the cross of the sacrificial schema subjected to some dramatic increasing tensions and the hybridization between the vegetal, ophidian, even human universes, as in the representation "Saint George Fighting the Dragon", made from an intertwinement of roots and in which, with a subtle touch, the world’s homogeneity at the level of matter offers a dramatic link to the conflict between good and evil. The adherence on the monopolizing programme of theological hermeneutics, culturally legitimated by the artistic creation support, enriches the formal repertoires and the field of preoccupations through the presence of textuality as a personal discourse elaboration and as an 
object and a visual contribution of the sign - book and letter/writing - and, as complex to the architecture object, the artist published a series of volumes with theologically aspiring texts and he realized a monument, an architecture on the typology of the temple, both activities being indebted to certain revelations. The most monumental works belong to the Angels series, being grave representations, with an anthropomorphic allusion, just as topic determinism, referencing through their vertical sobriety the morphology of the mountains. The reluctance towards calophile and descriptive anthropomorphism and towards representing the human figure in a discourse totally dedicated to the human drama accentuates his fidelity towards the requirements of his imagological programme subordinated to an archaic instance of the Physiognomy’s dogma, distinguishes him in the Romanian art context of the postmodern era. Marian Zidaru sporadically resorts, under the need’s pressure to express as convincingly as possible a package of meanings, to media that is allogeneic to sculpture - instalment, performance, ambient (temporarily), video transposition of the action (as in the two grand scenarios The Road of the Cross and Fire, or, as it was previously mentioned, in architecture). In the case of architecture, he acts as a sculptor, following the programme of his formal intuitions, of a severe monumentality.

Alexandra Titu (2014)
 


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    BIOGRAPHY

    (Baloteşti, Ilfov, 1956)

    Academic studies:
    1981 - 1985 - National University of Arts, class of Professor Vladmir Predescu, Bucharest, Romania.

    Professional activity:
    1987 - 1990 - Works on the Imperial Gate monument, Hunedoara, Romania;
    1991 - 1995 - Assistant professor, Sculpture department, National University of Arts, Bucharest, Romania.

    Scholarship:
    1982 - Creation Stipend of the Romanian Artists Union;
    1984 - Study Stipend, offered by Instituto Italiano di Cultura, Italy;
    1993 - Study Stipend, Kulturreferat, München, Germany;
    1994 - Study Stipend, Ludwig - Forum, Aachen, Germany;
    2011 - 2 months residency offered by Kulturampt, Düsseldorf, Germany.
     


    PROJECTS

    Personal Exhibitions:
    1983 - Personal Exhibiton, Atelier 35 Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
    1985 - Blood-stained Christmas, The Village Museum, Bucharest, Romania;
    1992 - Annunciation of New Jerusalem, Simeza Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
    1992 - 1993 - Unsealing, The Gallery of the Ion Mincu Architecture Institute, Bucharest, Romania;
    1993 - Kulturreferat Exhibition, atelier, Feldafing, Germany;
             - The New Jerusalem, Ublacker - Hausl Gallery, Munich, Germany;
    1993 - 1994 - Glory of New Jerusalem, 3/4 Floor Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
    1994 - Ludwig Forum, Aachen, Germany;
             - Glory of New Jerusalem, Art Museum, Bacău, Art Museum Cluj and Art Gallery, Timişoara, Romania;
    1994 - 1995 - The Theme, The National Museum of Art of Romania, Bucharest, Romania;
    1996 - Experiment, Soros Centre for Contemporary Art, 3/4 Floor Gallery, Romania;
    1996 - 1997 - A Christmas Story, Peleş Castle, Sinaia, Prahova County, Romania;
    1998 - Sign, Retrospective, Romanian Parliament Palace, Bucharest, Romania;
             - The Fire, The National Museum of Art of Romania, Contemporary Art Section;
    2000 - The Angels’ Ladder, Gallery 49, New York, USA;
             - The Angels’ Ladder, The Romanian Cultural Center, New York, USA;
             - Restoration of the Roman Empire, Orizont Galleries, Bucharest, Romania;
    2004 - ANO -Timpurile (The Four Seasons), Anaid Art  Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
    2007 - Seasons of Angels, Gallery Ho, Seoul, Korea;
    2008 - Infantilis, Căminul Artei Galleries, Bucharest, Romania;
             - Seasons of the Angels, Embassy of the Arts, Bucharest, Romania;
    2009 - Lords, Căminul Artei Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
    2010 - Flower's Dictatorship, Căminul Artei Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
             - Back to Art, Dancona-Budis Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
    2011 - Living and working in Düsseldorf, Mogoşoaia Palace, Bucharest, Romania;
             - Living and working in Düsseldorf, Simeza Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
             - Open studio, studio from Franz Jurgens Strasse 3, Düsseldorf, Germany;
             - Glories, Ateneo Veneto, Venice, Italy;
    2014 - Victim, Drawings 1984 - 2014 (I), H’ art Gallery, Bucharest, Romania;
             - Victim, Drawings 1984 - 2014 (II), C.F.P. Bucharest Gallery, Romania;
             - Angels, Thrones, Princes, The “Brancovan Palaces” Cultural Center, Ilfov County, Romania.

    International Participation (selection):
    1990 - Holzschnitt (Romanian Wood  Sculpture), Munich, Germany;
             - Une Soirée à Paris, Paris, France;
    1991 - São Paolo Biennale, São Paolo, Brasil;
    1992 - Exposición Universales, Sevilla '92, Spain;
    1993 - Byzantium after Byzantium, Instituto Romena di Cultura, Venice, Italy;
    1994 - Europe '94, Munich, Germany;
    1995 - La Biennale di Venetia, Romanian Pavillon, Venice, Italy;
    1997 - Bucharest  nach '89, Ludwig Forum, Aachen , Germany;
    1998 - Zeitgenossiche rumanische Kunst - Untergrund Messhale, Leipzig, Germany;
    2004 - Art of the Balkans, Thessaloniki, Greece;
    2007 - The Prodigal Son, Lutheran University Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA;
             - Seasons of the Angels - HO  Gallery, Seoul, South Korea;
             - Etno - Art, ICR Paris, France;
    2008 - Biennale of Architecture - Romanian pavilion - Venice, Italy;
             - Collaborates with New River Fine Art Gallery, Florida, USA, for three projects of monumental art;
    2009 - Man and Work, Gallery-Office, Starmetz Partner, Bucharest - Vienna - Frankfurt;
             - 2R Art Gallery, London, UK;
             - Mitologie Soggetive, Centro Espositivo Rocca Paolina, Perugia, Italy;
    2010 - L'ecahalier - Pirleazul, Cloitre des Billetes, Paris, France;
             - Gucken wir Mal, The Museum of the Romanian Peasant, Bucharest, Romania;
    2011 - Gucken wir Mal, "Atelier am Eck", Dusseldorf, Germany;
             - Beckante Flugobjeckte, Meinersen, Germany;
             - BuKarest - Düsseldorf, Gherhart Hauptmann Haus, Düsseldorf, Germany.

    Awards and Prizes:
    1984 - Atelier 35 Prize;
    1985 - Second Prize at the 7th Drawing Biennal, Cleveland, England;
    1987 - Young Artists Prize, Romanian Artists Union;
    1990 - Creation Stipend, Romanian Artists Union;
    1995 - The Annual “Ionel Jianu” Distinction, American - Romanian Academy;
    2004 - Nominated for “Ion Andreescu” Prize, awarded by the Romanian Academy.
     


    BIBLIOGRAPHY