Icons of Utopia

    The garden is in Andrei Ciurdărescu’s philosophical works the perfect materialization of the utopic idea of human control over nature, a space of tension between two major forces of creation: the creator and his creation become in its turn creator. This never-ending back-and-forth cycle between creator and creation as creator is a recurrent theme of Andrei Ciurdărescu’s artistic works, as well as of nowadays questions about artificial intelligence. Profoundly and personally attached to the idea of ground/earth as distinctive genetic human aspect, Ciurdărescu organizes his paintings as a baroque scenographer, in grandiose, sensuous rich, dramatic, full of vitality, moving, tense and emotional exuberant scenes in intense light and dark shadows.

    The connection to Mother Gaea is expressed by elements of a sensual tactile pictorial language: rocks, majestic delicate white lilies, the illustrious carnal agave, the apparent pristine neoromantic wilderness or through elements that imaginatively compose the scene: sounds, the smell of noble lilies, the hot summer air, the night coldness. To all these botanical elements belonging to nature, Andrei adds the statue of Venus as an iconic element of the urban anthropic landscape. Venus is the mythological deity of beauty, sensuality but also of war and magic. No surprise that the painter adds statues of famous Roman emperors to express power and balance.

    This pictorial rendition disguises a poetic undercurrent of the symbolic polysemantic character: an archeological quest to discover and reveal the symbolic base of the European culture and civilization. Yet, the statues of once perfectly beautiful Venus are now hideous, broken and invaded by and almost prisoner of the spontaneous nature. A monumental civilization is under the monumental force of the rebel nature. Creation becomes creator. The broken remains and debris of the ancient days recollects reflections of a utopic past and reveals the true nature of the present and an urgent need of a philosophical reconstruction of values, icons and life.

Diana Andrei, curator @ Art Halle Gallery - Icons of Utopia / 2019