At the beginning of the First World War, the Avakian family (mother, three girls and two boys), like many other families who escaped the 1915 pogrom, left their homeland and took refuge in Romania, first settling in Dobrogea, at Balchik. Here, seeing his worthiness and enthusiasm, Jean Alexandru Steriadi proposed to Avakian to come to Bucharest, offering him shelter at the Kalinderu Museum, of which he was director, and hired him as a museum guard.

Hrandt Avakian was based on free painting studies performed by the masters of Romanian fine arts such as Jean Alexandru Steriadi and Alexandru Satmari.

Hrandt Avakian exhibited in many painting exhibitions in Bucharest (1928,1943, 1957, 1963, 1967 and 1975) and in Yerevan (Armenia) (1960 and 1962)

He also participated in the “Drawing and Engraving Salon” in Bucharest, in 1930, as well as in the “Official Salon” in 1934.

Also in 1934, Hrandt Avakian and Ștefan Constantinescu open in Bucharest an exhibition with paintings depicting Balchik.

His works are exhibited in museums in Romania, such as the “Zambaccian Museum” in Bucharest, the “National Museum of Art” in Cluj and the “Museum of Art” in Constanța, but also in collections abroad (France, Bulgaria, Germany, Lebanon, Russia and the USA).

After the Second World War, Hrandt and his sister Beatrice began to systematically collect art objects, which they donated to the Romanian state in 1971. Starting with 1974, this collection became accessible to the public, in the building in Str. Architect Ion Mincu no. 19.

The collection of brothers Beatrice and Hrandt Avakian, made up of oriental art objects, paintings on silk and ivory figurines from Japan, statuettes from India, Tibet, Arab countries, goldsmith’s pieces made by craftsmen from Sibiu, England or France, but also a series of paintings by artists such as Grigorescu, Pallady, Steriadi or Petrașcu, remained in this location until 1978, when it was transferred to the Museum of Art Collections.

He left for France, to Paris, and enrolled at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, after which he rented his own workshop in Montmartre (1912-1913). He returned to the country in 1913.

In 1895, he enrolled at the Academy of Arts, in Uhde’s studio. In 1897, he worked with Hollosy in Baia Mare. He also studied at the Julian Academy with Jean Paul Laurens. Exhibits in Paris. Back in the country, he exhibits at the exhibition of living artists. He participated in the establishment of the Artistic Youth Society in 1902, and, as its founder, enjoyed success.

His compositions are praised. In 1902, he organized the first personal exhibition. N. Grigorescu expresses his admiration for his painting. He works intensely on landscapes from Moldova, Brăila, Herța. He also makes drawings. The impressionism of his painting acquires a particular note, devoid of spontaneity. He exhibited Artistic Youth in Athens and Munich. He is awarded at the Official Salon. He also stands out as a portraitist, being considered the equal of G.D.Mirea. Executes murals: the ceiling of the houses Kalinderu and Cantacuzino. He paints nudes in a secessionist spirit. Over time, his painting becomes idyllic. During the war he remained in Bucharest, under German occupation, which made public opinion unfavorable to him later.

He organizes a free painting academy. Along with the offensive against Artistic Youth, Verona suffers a lot of criticism. His last prestigious event was in 1921, with a large personal exhibition. Participates in the Venice Biennale. He continues to be appointed to the jury, but harsh criticism affects him and, in 1934, suffering from rheumatism, he is threatened with paralysis. Many of his works were destroyed in a fire in 1937 (over 100 works).

He died on March 26, 1946, suffering and forgotten, in Bucharest.

He had his first personal exhibition in Iași, in the halls of the National Theater, in 1900. He was appointed professor at the Normal School (1901). He has personal exhibitions at the Athenaeum (1914 and 1915), Franklin Hall (1918 and 1919), Art (1921), Ileana (1925), Iasi (1927 and 1930), Dalles (1935 and 1937).

In 1916 he was appointed substitute teacher at the School of Fine Arts in Iasi. He exhibited at the Maison d’Art (1922-1923), the Vilagrosse Passage (1923), the Salon of Moldova (1942), Bucharest (1943).

The bench can be called the painter of the working class, due to the themes detached from the life of this social category. His painting is temperamental, sharp, a little primitive in sensations, expressionist in a plastic way.

Octav Băncilă enjoyed great popularity. He died on April 3, 1944, in Bucharest.

Initially he was inspired by the expressionist current, painting with thick lines and sharp angles, with a color in which earthy tones predominate.

After graduating, Iser worked for the socialist press at Fada and the Truth, where he published a large number of cartoons; The satirical drawings approached the problems of the Romanian society through the prism of the class conflict and were addressed especially to the monarchy and the bourgeoisie, emphasizing at the same time, the role of the labor movement.

During his maturity, Iser’s painting includes life scenes on Dobrogean themes with portraits of local Tartars.

Adopting a brighter color with an exotic touch, the compositions acquire balance and monumentality. After World War II he painted socialist themes again, especially portraits of workers.

In 1955 he was elected a member of the Romanian Academy, and died in 1958 in Bucharest.

(Born 1883, Turnu Măgurele-Dec.1968, Bucharest)

He was a Romanian painter, draftsman, watercolourist and fresco artist, best known for his religious works. Gheorghe Chirovici is the co-founder of the Romanian Artists Union, together with Leon Biju, Elena Alexandrina Bednarik, Ignat Bednarik, Adam Bălțatu, Lucian Grigorescu, Paul Molda and Gheorghe Simotta.

Life and studies:

He was born in Craiova in 1883 and after a short apprenticeship with the Italian artists who worked on the painting of the church in Turnu Măgurele, he left for Bucharest to enroll in the School of Fine Arts. But he gave up after a few years, preferring to look for his own artistic path. He exhibited for the first time around 1913, but only after the war did he really start his exhibition activity, with a long series of annual personal exhibitions and participations in Salons, during the third decade. Practicing a style of Gregorian descent, but addressing thematic areas not explored by the master (the religious spirituality of the Romanian peasant),

Chirovici is a great success with the public of the time, quite traditionalist, among his loyal buyers being the sovereign pair of Romania. There follows a period of artistic introspection, favored by travels in Europe (Yugoslavia, Italy, France) and resulting in a reconfiguration of the style that acquires a new force becoming more analytical, more sober.

Opera:

The artist’s paintings, one of the important representatives of poster art in Romania, are found especially in private collections. George Chirovici, a subtle watercolorist, is known (and) as the painter of the crucifixes, his art impressing with the accuracy of the drawing and temperate tones, an admirable chromatic spectacle in which the colors of sands, burned mermaids are dominant, in a perfect musical arrangement with velvety whites and pale yolks; a painting with which you become friends and in which you live, which, once “read”, deciphered leisurely, you miss.

The broad theme, related to the life of the peasant, nature, Mediterranean landscapes or the picturesque urban, opens as many “windows” to receive the message contained. The painter’s artistic activity also includes projects for arranging public spaces, theater and opera scenography, stamp models, banknotes and medals.

He studied at the Royal Academy in Munich and then in Paris.

He led the Aman Museum, then the Kalinderu Museum and was a teacher at the School of Fine Arts in Bucharest.

He is the initiator and promoter of black and white graphic salons.

In the first period of creation, Steriadi was preoccupied with large-scale composition depicting scenes from the lives of ordinary people.

Later he painted with an emotion sometimes shrouded in a slight melancholy, urban and aquatic landscapes, corners of old Bucharest, images from Dobrogea, and from his many travels.

Steriadi’s painting has a delicately nuanced luminosity that attests to the assimilation of the most precious features of Impressionism.
A talented illustrator, he is the author of numerous sketch portraits that touch on Romanian graphics, a culmination of the genre through the precision of his characterization, the spirit of observation, the intelligent humor.

Constantin Jiquidi made his debut at the age of 17 with Tipuri din Iași, then collaborated with the humorous magazine “Bobârnacul” from Iași, being recognized as a great talent.

The final consecration took place with the appearance, also in Iași, of the first volume of the album Caricatures.

In 1889 he settled permanently in Bucharest, where he was for a short time one of the most appreciated cartoonists of the capital, until his death at only 34 years old, caused by phthisis.

He collaborated with I.L. Caragiale, as a graphic designer, at “Moftul român”.
He was probably the first cartoonist to publish comics in Romania, in the magazine “Amicul Copiilor”, in 1893.

His album productions are: Parliamentary Profiles (1886), Journalists by Nature (1888), Types of the Country (1889), Faculty of Medicine (1895).
Jiquidi also made some oil paintings, watercolors, illustrations.