130

Sandu Darie

(Romanian/Cuban, 1908-1991)

"Untitled"

oil on panel
signed lower right.
Together with a Certificado de Autenticad from Roberto Cobas Amate.
Framed.
28" x 24-1/4", framed 35-1/4" x 31"

  • Provenance: Notes: Before he was hailed as one of Cuba's most revolutionary and celebrated artists, Romanian-born Sandu Darie initially trained as a lawyer. Finding the field stifling, he pivoted towards the arts, corresponding with Romanian avant-garde artists, like Stephan Roll and Medi Dinu, while working as a cartoonist in his twenties. In 1941, Darie relocated from Paris to Havana, where he became a Cuban citizen and officially launched his career as a painter. The island's vibrant natural beauty – full of light, shape, and color – deeply influenced Darie, and his early work reflects a strong emphasis on these formal elements. He integrated into the local fine art circuit easily, gaining acclaim for his early exhibitions at the Havana Lyceum in 1949 and 1950, solidifying his status as an important figure of modern art in Cuba.

    Darie's mature style was greatly influenced by Neoplasticism, as demonstrated by Untitled, offered here. Characterized by straight, vertical and horizontal lines, geometric precision, and bright colors, Untitled exemplifies his dedication to freeing fine art from any objective referent. He believed that figurative and representational art was limited in its creativity, as such images compelled viewers to connect the work to concepts, emotions, and implications unrelated to the creative object itself. Stripping down his paintings to their most structural elements rendered them as acts of pure creation, an ideal Darie strived toward for the entirety of his career.

    Darie's work was internationally recognized during his lifetime, and after his death in 1991. By then, his work had been exhibited in countries such as the United States, Japan, and the Netherlands, and acquired by several permanent collections, like the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Royal Fine Arts Academy in The Hague. With a long, prolific career that established him as one of Cuba's most ingenious and accomplished artists, Darie is perhaps best known as a visionary whose influence continues to resonate today.
  • Condition: **Surface dirt throughout. Scattered light and dark accretions. Under UV light, a lightened area upper left (cream) and horizontal arc area visible (center to mid right), possibly the hand of the artist.
    Distressed motif frame with losses in corners and along edges.


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