Gheorghe Petrașcu (; 20 November 1872, Tecuci – 1 May 1949, Bucharest) was a Romanian painter. He won numerous prizes throughout his lifetime and had his paintings exhibited posthumously at the Paris International Exhibition and the Venice Biennale. He was the brother of N. Petrașcu, a literary critic and novelist.
In 1936, Petrașcu was elected a titular member of the Romanian Academy. Membrii Academiei Române din 1866 până în prezent at the Romanian Academy site
He was born in Tecuci, Romania, in a family with cultural traditions. His parents were small owners from Fălciu County, Costache Petrovici-Rusciucliu and his wife Elena, maiden name Bițu-Dumitriu. Brother of the diplomat, writer and literary and art critic Nicolae Petrașcu, Gheorghe Petrașcu showed artistic inclinations as a young man, doing his first studies at the National University of Arts in Bucharest. At the recommendation of Nicolae Grigorescu, he received a scholarship to improve abroad. After a short time in Munich, he left for Paris, where he enrolled at the Académie Julian and worked in Bouguereau's studio (1899–1902). From his first personal exhibition at the Romanian Athenaeum (1900), he was noticed by the writers Barbu Ștefănescu Delavrancea and Alexandru Vlahuță, who bought him a work.
With unbridled passion, he painted landscapes, both in the country (Sinaia, Târgu Ocna, Câmpulung-Muscel), and in France (Vitré, Saint-Malo), Spain (San Martin Bridge in Toledo) and especially in Italy (Venice, Chioggia, Naples). In his landscapes, light does not erase the contours as in the Impressionists. On the contrary, the rectilinear architectures are imposed by an impression of solidity. From this point of view, the Venetian landscapes best demonstrate Petrașcu's anticonformism. The artist resists traditional interpretations, in which the landscape of the city on the lagoon was only a pretext to analyze the interference of light vibrations, in eternal change on water, on colored walls and in the pure air.
For Petrașcu, Venice possessed grandeur, "with the brilliance of ancient relics, evoking the history of ancient palaces, with their serious and fascinating poetry." Petrașcu creates through a juxtaposition of faded red, with shades of blue, gray and brown. This successive overlap gives Petrașcu's paste an almost sculptural structure, the roughness of the color influences the regime of shadows and light as the accents of a relief. The self-portrait in the Zambaccian Museum seems to descend from the Italian Renaissance, of a solemn gravity but also with a note of sensuality.
In personal exhibitions, between 1903 and 1923 at the Romanian Athenaeum, then at the "Home of Art" (1926–1930), culminating with the two retrospectives at the "Sala Dalles" in 1936 and 1940. He participated in the Venice Biennale (1924, 1938 and 1940); he received the Grand Prize of the International Exhibition in Barcelona (1929) and the same in Paris (1937).
Memorialistic, general considerations Once the time had passed, the work that Gheorghe Petrașcu left to posterity, about three thousand paintings and many graphic works became a dowry of fine art on which all sorts of observations were made, all of them being different.Vasile Florea... pag. 5 Those who studied his work and valued his creation found that there is a lot of confusion and erroneous appreciation in his biography. There were minimizations, invectives and unjust criticisms, many persiflages but also truisms, benevolent platitudes, exaggerations and praise of circumstance. Critical analyzes have made essential and judicious references, often definitive. It is noteworthy that the early assessments that were validated by the late contemporaneity, remained equally valid today. The pertinent, sometimes subtle, remarks made by Ștefan Petică are telling in the conditions in which he did not have an overview of the Petrascian work. In the period before the First World War, there were penetrating comments by Apcar Baltazar, B. Brănișteanu (the literary pseudonym of Bercu Braunstein), N.D. Cocea, Marin Simionescu-Râmniceanu, Tudor Arghezi, Theodor Cornel (the literary pseudonym of Toma Dumitriu), Iosif Iser, Adrian Maniu, etc.
During the Interwar period, Francisc Șirato, Nicolae Tonitza, Nichifor Crainic made significant contributions, followed by George Oprescu, Oscar Walter Cisek, Alexandru Busuioceanu, Petru Comarnescu, Ionel Jianu, Lionello Venturi and Jacques Lassaigne. All of them made the effort to explain and understand the creation of the Romanian artist. It is noteworthy that in the press chronicle during the painter's lifetime, the same observations were made, repeated to satiety by dozens of commentators. The art historian Vasile Florea opined that even today the same appreciations are made by those who study Petrașcu's work, without knowing that they do it by rediscovering certain aspects that others have stated decades before. Florea was also has an opinion that the process of revealing the meanings of the artist's creation will be completed with great difficulty due to the vastness of the work and its rich meanings. In support of this opinion are the synthesis studies and monographs published after 1944 by Ionel Jianu, George Oprescu, Krikor Zambaccian, Tudor Vianu, Aurel Vladimir Diaconu, Eleonora Costescu, Eugen Crăciun and Theodor Enescu. According to Vasile Florea, the analysis of the artist's creation must be made on two levels: one of a Petrașcu in a continuous evolution through a slowness of movement and a steady one, characterized by immobility, which summarizes the first "... as ontogeny summarizes phylogeny".
Socio-cultural affiliation Gheorghe Petrașcu was born in Tecuci, Moldova. Tecuci was first mentioned in Iancu Rotisiavovici's deed in 1134.A. Costin: Orașul Tecuci, în Literatură și artă română, a. XIII, nr. 4, 5, 6/1909, pag. 112–121 In Descriptio Moldavie, Dimitrie Cantemir mentioned the locality as "... the poor seat of two parishioners who are given the responsibility of this land". The geographical area in the middle of which it was established as a settlement gave it a distinct shape and a social and economic life that was defined over time as a separate entity.Vasile Florea... pag. 7
"...Nothing has changed; nothing was ruined, nothing was added to the old town that sleeps shrouded in fog on the banks of the peaceful Bârlad. The same wide streets covered with gray pebbles stretch silently, in the dust that rises thin as a shadow of incense smoke spread in a ruined church. The same large and spacious courtyards, courtyards made for abundance and living life to the fullest, are pampered in their patriarchal appearance and the same small and simple houses resembling the comforting smile of old women show their modest faces under rustic roofs."----- Ștefan Petică: Tecuciul removed. Autumn Notes, in Works, 1938, pp. 243–251
In a brief analysis of Petrașcu's work, it seems that he did not feel the rooting of the environment where he was born because the paintings, which he painted during trips through Romania, Europe or Egypt (Africa), do not lead to the birthplaces, although a few remained there. Without subscribing to the theory of geographical determinism supported by Hyppolyte Taine and Garabet Ibrăileanu, who stated the thesis according to which an artist owes to the space where the main features of his creation were born, one can discern in Gheorghe Petrașcu's works.
Regarding the composition of the personalities of Tecuci and the neighboring areas gave to the Romanian spirituality, Gheorghe Petrașcu was part of a socio-cultural enclave formed by many writers like Alexandru Vlahuță, Theodor Șerbănescu, Dimitrie C. Ollănescu-Ascanio, Alexandru Lascarov– Moldovanu, Nicolae Petrașcu (the artist's brother), Ion Petrovici, Ștefan Petică, Duiliu Zamfirescu and Dimitrie Anghel. All these writers differ from the exponents of the great Boerism who created junimism. They were closer to the ideals of the bourgeoisie and some like Stefan Petica or Dimitrie Anghel were ready to adopt radicalist doctrines. With Petică and Dimitrie Anghel, Petrașcu had a lot in common, all three being good friends.
There is not much information about the places where he was born and where he lived until adolescence. At the exhibition events that took place until 1916, the artist presented only a few landscapes that he painted in Nicorești and Coasta Lupii. Even in the evocations he made in the press of the time, he mentioned only essential biographical data. This syncope from the painter's biography can be supplemented by reading the writings by which Ștefan Petică, Calistrat Hogaș, Nicolae Petrașcu, Ioan Petrovici or Alexandru Lascarov-Moldovanu evoked the so-called "city of long sleep" invoked by Petică.Vasile Florea... pag. 8
Family
Gheorghe Petrașcu, Iorgu as his relatives called him, was born into a wealthy family on 1 December 1872. As Nicolae Petrașcu stated, their parents were "... people without any education, not knowing how to speak Romanian, but, in their midst, important people, recognized by an exemplary morality."Nicolae Petrașcu: Biografia mea... pag. 105Nicolae Petrașcu: Icoane... pag. 1 The father, Costache Petrovici, was nicknamed the Prophet by friends because he foresaw the weather. He was originally from Focșani and had settled in Tecuci as a result of his marriage to Elena, born Bițu-Dimitriu. "... He was a brown man, fit for stature, wise and balanced in all his deeds and words, caring for his clothes, with a burning desire to teach his children the book."Vasile Florea... pag. 9 His occupation was agriculture, in addition to the vineyard from Nicorești he also had an estate of 200 falce in Boghești, on the Zeletin valley, which was about five hours away with the Tecuci carriage.
To find out the artist's more distant origin, research must be done in the south Danube regions, George Călinescu stated that the painter's father's name was Costache Petrovici-Rusciucliu. A cousin of his Romanianized his name by calling him Petrașin, so that the last modification would be made by Nicolae, Gheorghe's brother, in Petrașcu.Nicolae Petrașcu: Biografia mea... pag. 1 The linguist Iorgu Iordan, also born in Tecuci, seems to have known, in Vasile Florea's opinion, that the primary doctor of the city was Petrovici and has changed his name to Petraș.Iorgu Iordan: Dicționar al numelor de familie românești, Editura Științifică și pedagogic, București, 1983, pag. 13
Gheorghe Petrașcu did not know his father because the latter died shortly after the artist was born. Thus, his mother became a widow at the age of 36. Nicolae describes her as "... sensitive to music [her own property and that of her father, n.a. Vasile Florea], singing the lance whenever he passed from our room through the hall, to the living room, and with a kind of philosophy of it, spoken in short Romanian words, whose beauty sometimes amazes you."Nicolae Petrașcu: Biografia mea... pag. 2–3 In old age, she was evoked by her cousin Ion Petrovici (probably the primary care physician, not Vasile Florea) who said that she was "... a weak and prematurely bleached old woman, funny almost unwittingly and who liked to hum, taking forced breaks only when he was with the world, so that when he was left alone for a moment, he would instantly resume a fashionable area."Ion Petrovici... De-a lungul unei vieți... pag. 61 The inclination towards music was transmitted from his parents to Gheorghe Petrașcu, as he had a baritone voice, as his daughter remembered Mariana Petrașcu.Mariana Petrașcu: Tata, în Contemporanul din 2 mai 1969